Perhaps Pinky can now stop asking Brain what it is they will be doing tonight!
Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
101–110 of 144 posts
Re: Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, it's not for a sore knee. Is there anything more unapproved than an irreversible disease that destroys your mind in the space of a few years? It's not like cancer, from which you might be cured, or at least with which you can have a meaningful life until your eventual death. It is a slow motion process of erasure that is well on its way at the moment of the first diagnosis. Taking the wrong medicine could short…
Taking chemicals which haven't been made for human consumption and haven't been tested thoroughly could render you dead much faster than that.
Alzheimer's is such an awful way to go, I can see how people would chance it.
Re: Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
#103Earlier quoted context omitted.
>>Mouse models are rapidly becoming obsolete as it's becoming easier than ever to model entire, differentiated tissues grown from red blood cell-derived adult stem cells. No they aren't. Transgenic mouse models are a $billion industry. We do not understand biological mechanisms nearly enough to not use live animal models. We are not even able to recreate single cell organisms with our level of knowledge and engineeri…
Overcompensating by treating animals well isn't a valid rationalization for anything which comes next, regardless of benefit.
So the human lives saved would be the valid rationalization.
Re: Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
#104Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you use this on someone else with Alzheimer's and they die or are injured, you will almost definitely go to jail. You could likely use it on yourself, but look at it as an extreme, it is still less bad than suicide I suppose... But you don't know what the side effects could be. It kind of scares me that people think they can buy untested chemicals online and self-medicate with them. But then again I'm not into the…
It kind of scares me that people with terminal or completely debilitating diseases don't have widespread access to whatever experimental treatments are available. Imagine watching yourself die and reading articles about promising treatments you are unable to obtain. That is scary.
An additional issue: While I am interested in an experimental drug and have no issues with its risk of death, my children / wife / family may choose to hold the drug liable in the case I die. I could make it as clear as possible that I would not hold the drug liable but if I die those words don't matter.
Re: Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, it's not for a sore knee. Is there anything more unapproved than an irreversible disease that destroys your mind in the space of a few years? It's not like cancer, from which you might be cured, or at least with which you can have a meaningful life until your eventual death. It is a slow motion process of erasure that is well on its way at the moment of the first diagnosis. Taking the wrong medicine could short…
Taking chemicals which haven't been made for human consumption and haven't been tested thoroughly could render you dead much faster than that.
When it comes to rapid onset dementia, that's a risk many people are willing to take.
Re: Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
Average life expectancy is a commonly misunderstood (and widely misrepresented) concept. We hear things like "Humans really only lived into their 40s in the Stone Age," or what have you. This is untrue. Average (arithmetic mean) life expectancy was a lot lower because it was heavily skewed by infant mortality. Up until very recently, many more babies died within their first few years of life. We've dramatically impro…
Many more people are living in to their 70's, 80's and 90's than previously in human history. While our lifespan may not have increased much, the proportion of people reaching the extreme ends of our lifespan continues to rise. It's not just about infant mortality (not to mention death from childbirth).
"Many more people are living in to their 70's, 80's and 90's than previously in human history."
Correct, though largely (not entirely, but very largely) because the proportion of people living past age ~3 has skyrocketed. Correct for that factor, and our life expectancy is actually lower than it was in, say, mid-Victorian England.
(Note, as well, that I'm referring to life expectancy and not, say, the potential maximum human lifespan).
Re: Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, it's not for a sore knee. Is there anything more unapproved than an irreversible disease that destroys your mind in the space of a few years? It's not like cancer, from which you might be cured, or at least with which you can have a meaningful life until your eventual death. It is a slow motion process of erasure that is well on its way at the moment of the first diagnosis. Taking the wrong medicine could short…
Taking chemicals which haven't been made for human consumption and haven't been tested thoroughly could render you dead much faster than that.
Some people go to Switzerland for specific chemicals to render them dead as fast as possible, since they see it as preferable to living with Alzheimer's.
Admittedly it seems like a bit of a gamble to just start popping drugs whether they've been studied or not, but people spend lots of money on "natural" supplements which are at least usually reasonably safe but are even less likely to work.
Re: Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
You say that tongue in cheek, but as a non-scientist, I've always wondered how much "mouse science" ultimately translates to humans. My guess is it's very low, but knowing a percentage would help me better understand how to proceed reports like this.
Mice are ~30% similar genetically to humans, so a surprising amount of transfers. Rats are a bit more similar IIRC, but mice breed quicker so it's easier to do bigger studies... Source: Used to work in mouse research on addiction (alcohol, cocaine, nicotine, etc). Edit: This link gives even more specifics on the similarity: https://www.genome.gov/10001345 -- 30% is probably accurate, but in terms of function, it's ev…
30% similar? Didn't we find that bananas share 50% of genes with humans?
Re: Chemical clears Alzheimer's protein and restores memory in mice
#109This is heartening news; if not a cure, at least it suggests a promising avenue for future research into this terrible condition. This LiveScience[1] article is an easily read summary that also mentions a critique of the approach. Given the unfortunate history[2][3] of falsified Korean scientific research, it would be prudent to withhold judgment until these results have been reproduced in other labs around the world…
If it's a slow thing that happens with aging (as some research suggests) then this might also be an anti-aging treatment to a small extent in that it might restore a little bit of the health of a younger brain.