Promising New Tactic Found in Battle Against Alzheimer’s Disease | TIME.com

Promising New Tactic Found in Battle Against Alzheimer’s Disease | TIME.com: Reporting in the journal Neuron, Dr. Stephen Strittmatter, professor of neurology at Yale University School of Medicine, describes a missing link in the Alzheimer’s disease process that could lead the way to new drug-based treatments. Alzheimer’s is characterized by the presence of sticky deposits of a protein called amyloid, which the human body makes naturally, but tends to accumulate in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients. As the plaques grow, they starve nerve cells, cutting off their ability to communicate with other cells via synapses, leading to their death and to the symptoms of memory loss, dementia and impaired thinking that are signs of advanced disease.