Developments in fight against Parkinson's Disease

Japanese researchers have shown that monkey stem cells can repair the brain damage caused by Parkinson’s disease. According to the Journal of Clinical Investigation, the same concept of treatment can be used on humans using embryonic stem cells instead. Stem cells are cells that can be manipulated into becoming any of a number of mature cells within the body when they are put in the right conditions. The research on this new alternative treatment was done by taking stem cells from monkeys and encouraging these cells to grow into brain cells that are damaged as a result of the disease. These brain cells are the ones that produces the chemical messenger dopamine. The effect was reduction in the symptoms of Parkinson’s in the monkey. The Kyoto University team commented that more research was needed to ensure the safety and effectiveness of the treatment as similar experiment was done on rodents which went on to develop tumors. Dr. J. William Langston of the Parkinson’s Institute in California, said: “While the observations in the current study are encouraging, the number of surviving dopamine-producing neurons was very low. It is good news that tumors were not observed, but this could also be related to the small number of surviving cells.”

On the other side of the world, Andrea Lozano, Senior Scientist at the Toronto Western Research Institute, and his colleagues discovered the protein produced by a gene called BAG5 inhibits parkin activity and another protein, Hsp70 that works with parkin. Parkin is part of the cell's "garbage disposal" system that rids the cell of unwanted proteins by degrading them. In the brain, the parkin protein works with Hsp70, which helps correct the folding of misfolded proteins. Loss of such ability causes such protein garbage to aggregate into lethal clumps in neurons - a hallmark of many neurodegenerative diseases. Experiments on rats showed that BAG5 enhances the destruction of the dopaminergic neurons targeted by Parkinson’s. Therefore, the inhibition of this gene would reduce such destruction. The increase of cell survival can be achieved by intervening the interaction between BAG5 and parkin and Hsp70. “Based no our findings, we propose a novel mechanism for neurodegeneration in which BAG5 interacts with both parkin and Hsp70, resulting in decreased parkin and Hsp 70 fuction, two outcomes that are deleterious to cell survival,” concluded the researchers. They also added, “Given the role of BAG5 in modulating ubi quitinylation, protein aggregation, and cell death, it may serve as a useful therapeutic target for neurodegenerative diseases such as PD.”


Discovery of key protein's shape could lead to improved bacterial Pneumonia vaccine

Scientists at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital have discovered that the shape of a protein on the surface of pneumonia bacteria helps these germs invade the human bloodstream. This finding, published December 16 2004 online by the EMBO Journal, could help scientists develop a vaccine that is significantly more effective at protecting children against the disease.

According to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, this breakthrough is significant in the development of vaccine towards this disease. Presently, the current pneumonia vaccines are mostly designed to protect adults against the sickness and do not work in young children. “The fact that we now know the structure of this important protein means we can begin to develop a vaccine that is more effective in children than those that are currently available,” said Richard W. Kriwacki, Ph.D., associate member of St. Jude Structural Biology.

Streptococcus pneumonia bacteria uses a molecule that is shaped like a large paddle to latch onto cells lining the throat and lungs. This protein was determined by researchers from St. Jude Children’s Research Hospitals and called it CbpA, holds the key to developing a new vaccine. “Using CbpA as the key part of a new vaccine against S. pneumoniae would solve a problem that now hinders our ability to protect children from this infection,” said Elaine Tuomanen, M.D. St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital stated that the knowledge of the shape of CbpA will guide researchers in their efforts to use part or all of this protein as the basis of a vaccine against S. pneumoniae.

The discovery of this crucial structure included studies on how this protein work in the body as well as the determination of its actual structure using laboratory tools. The technology involved with the discovery of the protein’s structure was Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and circular dishroism (CD). Another research laboratory specialist in Tuomanen’s lab confirmed that a bacteria carrying a mutated CbpA could not infect the human body. These discoveries proved that we are indeed closer to a vaccine than we were before.