Alzheimer’s disease is a devastating neurological disease that affects an estimated 5 million people today. According to WHO, without a cure that number will balloon to an estimated 15 million by 2050.

New research has demonstrated the Alzheimer’s disease processes begins as early as 20 years before clinical symptoms appear, an asymptomatic period referred to as the “silent phase” of Alzheimer’s. This period occurs long before someone is diagnosed with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) or Alzheimer’s.

For more than 20 years University of Minnesota researcher Karen Ashe, M.D., Ph.D. has received international recognition for her groundbreaking Alzheimer’s disease research.

Ashe developed genetically engineered mice that exhibit early indicators of Alzheimer’s disease. This allows Ashe and her team to study how the disease develops over time. By investigating specific brain proteins suspected to cause Alzheimer’s disease in humans, genetically engineered mice can help explain how Alzheimer’s develops.

Solving this molecular riddle will help Ashe better understand the disease, and inform her of where and when to intervene.

Researchers at the University of Minnesota’s Center for Drug Design have developed a synthetic compound that, in a mouse model, successfully prevents the neurodegeneration associated with Alzheimer’s disease.

In the pre-clinical study, researchers Robert Vince, Ph.D.; Swati More, Ph.D.; and Ashish Vartak, Ph.D., of the University’s Center for Drug Design, found evidence that a lab-made compound known as psi-GSH enables the brain to use its own protective enzyme system, called glyoxalase, against the Alzheimer’s disease process.

The discovery is published online in the American Chemical Society journal ACS Chemical Neuroscience and presents a new target for the design of anti-Alzheimer’s and related drugs …

The best way to treat a disease is to stop it before it begins. But what happens when you haven’t yet found the definitive reasons why a disease develops?

Alzheimer’s disease is one such condition.  Researchers know the condition involves progressive brain failure, but they simply don’t know all the reasons why the brain’s cells fail. As a result, for the 5.4 million Americans living with Alzheimer’s disease, current treatments address only the symptoms of Alzheimer’s and have yet to get to the root of the problem.

Any way to stop or treat the condition will be a tremendous medical advancement, and researchers at the University of Minnesota are at the forefront of that search.

Now, one group of University researchers may have found a pretty significant clue behind one cause of brain cell failure.