New drug 'may reverse Alzheimer's symptoms'

US scientists believe they have found a drug that will reverse the effects of Alzheimer's, after trials on mice proved successful.

The team from the Na­t­ional In­sti­tute of Neu­ro­lo­g­i­cal Dis­or­ders and Stroke administered the TFP5 molecule to mice that had been specially engineered to experience a version of Alzheimer's disease. Their research is published in the latest edition of the Federa­t­ion of Amer­i­can So­ci­eties for Ex­pe­ri­men­tal Bi­ol­o­gy journal.

After a series of injections to the abdominal region, the mice began to experience "restoration of memory loss" and reduction in other symptoms, without displaying any evidence of side-effects.

TFP5 works by preventing the overactive brain signal present in Alzheimer's patients that leads to a build-up of harmful plaques in the brain.

Editor of the journal Gerald Weissmann said: "Now that we know that we can tar­get the bas­ic mo­lec­u­lar de­fects in Alzheimer’s dis­ease, we can hope for treat­ments far bet­ter - and more spe­cif­ic - than an­y­thing we have to­day."

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