"This is the first study to show that [the compound] Cu(ATSM) can increase the abundance of P-gp clearance pumps in an Alzheimer's model, by 24.1 percent, effectively linking the repair of the blood-brain barrier to a reduction in toxic proteins and improved cognitive function," Dr. Pyun said.

"By improving the pumps, the brain can finally clear out the trapped waste. Over 56 days, the treatment reduced toxic amyloid-beta by 42 percent and improved spatial learning by nearly 44 percent."

"Cu(ATSM) is a copper compound with anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective properties that has already progressed to clinical testing for conditions like Parkinson's and ALS," Professor Nicolazzo said.

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[–] 98 points 2 months ago (9 children)

CNS disease drugs (Alzheimer's, stroke, ALS) translate from mice to humans under 10% of the time. Mouse models like the referenced primary source are poor proxies as they're engineered for single, clean pathologies (e.g. one mutation), while human neurodegeneration is messier, multifactorial, and not fully replicated even when surface features like amyloid plaques appear.

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  • [–] [S] 36 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    Since it's already in clinical trials for ALS and Parkinson's, hopefully testing for Alzheimer's can be done much more quickly than otherwise would be possible.

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  • [–] 21 points 2 months ago*

    Clinical trials for als are a crapshoot. They'll approve anything for a trial because what can it hurt

    Source: dad was in the radicava trial. Can't prove it, but he went fast. Probably faster than he would have without. They excluded him from the dataset because he was inconvenient.

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    [–] 62 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    In mice.. Time will tell, but Alzheimer dugs have a poor history in human trials. Some of even suggested that the model this is working on is wrong and thus it cannot work.

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  • [–] 23 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Yeah but they finally discovered and recalled the fake study that drove them in entirely the wrong direction for decades.

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  • [–] 16 points 2 months ago

    Yeah. The trouble is that pretty much only humans get Alzheimer’s. In order to make a mouse model, we have to induce a disease state that looks like Alzheimer’s, at least to our best understanding. It’s not unreasonable that our mouse model is just not really representative of the actual disease in humans.

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  • [–] 20 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (4 children)

    Didn't the amyloid-beta model get disproven? I am not following AD research that closely (I follow DBS research in neuro) but I remember reading a specific model (one that most of the research was tied up in) was disproven and it's why none of the mouse models were working on humans.

    edit: what timing. I just popped back on here and saw @ParadoxSeahorse@lemmy.world posted this article. I can't vouch for its contents as i'm not an AD researcher, but i think it's what i'm remembering

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  • [–] 9 points 2 months ago

    Thanks. From the article:

    One of its biggest mysteries is also its most distinctive feature: the plaques and other protein deposits that German pathologist Alois Alzheimer linked to the disease in 1906. In 1984, Aβ was identified as the main component of the plaques. And in 1991, researchers traced family-linked Alzheimer’s to mutations in the gene for a precursor protein from which amyloid derives.

    I haven’t checked all the sources, but the Aβ model predates the fraudulent papers, which were focused on the Aβ*56 “toxic oligomer” species. However, the model wasn’t looking too hot before hand, and it really resuscitated it. Now yeah, it may have been a zombie

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  • [–] 18 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    They've tried it with Gold too (Au{TISM}) but it had some interesting side effects, so wonder what side effects Cu(ATSM) will have.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 months ago*

    Maybe we’ll finally be able to live out our dreams of acting as captain James T Kirk, wandering the galaxy to have sex with green-skinned women

    Maybe we’ll party with that blue skinned guy taking colloidal silver and a bunch of furries, to declare ourselves the Federation

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  • [–] 14 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Hope theyll be able to make review on wether it's good or bad quality copper

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    [–] 13 points 2 months ago* (10 children)

    Cool, so they'll get bought up by an Alzheimer's medicine company that produces a medicine that doesn't work, and we'll never hear of this breakthrough again.

    Capitalism is great at killing off medicines that work, there's less profit in medicines that work.

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  • [–] 39 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    produces a medicine that doesn't work

    There's no reason to be needlessly jaded. Those companies would absolutely produce this if it worked, because you'd have to take it forever.

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  • [–] 11 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    The Internet is full of Dunning Kruger idiots who don't understand profit maximisation but believe they do.

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  • [–] 11 points 2 months ago

    Wdym? If a drug like this were successful, everybody with any markers for Alzheimer's would want to be in on it. They'd make bank for several years, until the patent expires, and then they'd have other methods of extending the patent and prolonging market exclusivity.

    Sorry but this is a shit talking point. What drug companies fear is the eradication of an ailment, and particularly by non-pharmaceutical means (i.e. gene therapy).

    Even something that's 100% effective in preventing Alzheimer's, would still see a hell of a market.

    And if such a drug is possible, then there's the game theory question. Any pharma exec knows that if their company can make a breakthrough medicine...so too could another company. Is it worth it for them to sit on it, only for another company to make the same discovery a year or two later and bring it to market?

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    [–] 11 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    Wait till they find out about the copper magnet bracelets that cure everything.

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    [–] 5 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    I have this habit of sucking on pennies, helps clear my head. Maybe there's something to this.

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  • [–] 9 points 2 months ago* (2 children)

    Very little copper in modern pennies, you should probably just supplement zinc. Helps with colds as well.

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  • [–] 11 points 2 months ago

    Proportionally little copper in modern pennies. But the outside is a thin veneer of copper plating. Unless they are nomming on an individual coin long enough the for their saliva to eat through the copper layer like the chocolate on a peanut m&m, then their exposure is no different than a wholey copper coin.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (18 children)

    Sounds like those hookey copper bands and junk they used to sell weren't hokum after all lol

    Edit - /s

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  • [–] 4 points 2 months ago (8 children)

    I wonder how they feel about magnets, lol.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    Put the magnets in the water - no more magnets.

    Bigly.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (3 children)
  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (8 children)

    That’s not how drugs work. Even if it worked in humans, they were not treating the mice through skin contact.

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  • [–] 7 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    I think he was making a joke...

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  • [–] 7 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    Lol I thought it was pretty obvious that was the case but based on the downvotes I should've clarified

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    I was hoping it was a joke. Downvotes were not me.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    I'm not worried about it. Def a joke. Anyone buying those is the real joke. This drug did sound promising though. I hope it works, that stuff runs in my family and that's scary.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 months ago

    Oh, I bet copper from Flock cameras has this effect too!

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