Our memories make us who we are but it's thought 30 million people today are
losing them due to the curse of our time Alzheimer's but the latest generation of
research has unleashed a new front in the war against this devastating disease
allows us to see the signs of Alzheimer's disease earlier than we ever
could before we believe that this trial marks the dawn of a new era in
Alzheimer's prevention research scientists are confident that a cure is
tantalizingly close in an Alzheimer's brain a protein starts to build up in
the synapses blocking the electrical signals and disrupting the flow of
information this protein is called amyloid beta for some reason the brain
can tolerate a certain level of amyloid for a number of years possibly many
years and it's as though the amyloid which may be driving the process needs
something else to then go on to produce that destruction of brain cells that
causes the symptoms and the devastation at the individual level
it's called tau the new era of research is focusing on treating the disease in
its earliest stages this family carries a gene notation which can be traced back
to an ancestor who arrived from Spain 400 years ago dr. Eric rhymers Institute
is focusing on the Apple 4 gene because it's so closely connected to the way the
disease progresses the leading theory is that it leads to the development of
Alzheimer's disease by reducing our ability to get rid of amyloid in the
brain up until this point people had to wait until they had memory and thinking
problems or had a diagnosis until they were given access to a clinical trial
now we were giving clinical trials offering clinical trials to people who
are at high risk to see if we can stave off the onset of the
I'm very touched to be a part of that process but the new era also aims to
understand what is happening inside the brains of sufferers as the disease
develops from its earliest stages professor fox has invented a technique
comparing a sequence of yearly scans which track the progress of the disease
the new technology has allowed us to see a window of maybe a decade before those
symptoms and that's where the new trials are starting to target what we're seeing
here in this area which is the hippocampus which is critical for memory
we see just full of town professor Matthew Walker from University of
California is investigating how plenty of deep sleep could preserve our
memories and help fight off the disease we want to explore whether that sleep
deterioration in aging and in Alzheimer's disease is not simply a
symptom of the process but perhaps a cause of the underlying memory problems
sleep seems to play a crucial role in preventing the accumulation of amyloid
so professor Walker is trying to find ways of artificially inducing deep sleep
success could slow the development of disease and strengthen our memories I
think there's a lot of excitement now because there's some new data that looks
very promising every two weeks floor goes of physical
and cognitive tests and she's given an injection which could be the brand-new
out Simas drug cronyism up or it could be a placebo for dr. Lapera the trial
offers a new future Esteban mucho mas optimises las familias esta mucho mas
optimists por que durante Trenton OHS nunca Lisa V amo Sofres adone Esperanza
therapeutic ax a la primera vez que cela que saber the drug called a Duke alum AB
was what everyone had been hoping for the results and share prices in the
pharmaceutical company Biogen rocketing the trial showed that the drug was
having a remarkable impact on the brains of people with Alzheimer's the scan on
the right shows just how effective the drug has been in removing amyloid plaque
from the brain but a major complication has now been discovered the main side
effect that we saw with this drug in the clinical trial was a thing called Aria
and what we see here is a picture of Aria and what we see is the whiteness
here in this in the brain which signifies edema or swelling in the brain
and that's not a good thing because the brain is in an enclosed space and
swelling it can be harmful to patients Neal Cory is now participating in the
trial he doesn't know whether he's on a placebo or the drug but taking part has
made all the difference recently he was even able to speak off
the cuff at his son's wedding I was like my old self I really yeah it was an
extemporaneous wasn't any um rehearsal or written words or anything he just got
up and he spoke and it flowed it was nice it was really nice