Scientists decode role of glucose in Alzheimer's, Parkinson's disease

Researchers have identified how healthy neurons metabolise glucose an advance which may have implications for understanding neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimers and ParkinsonsThe human brain has a sweet tooth burning through nearly one quarter of the bodys sugar energy or glucose each dayThe team from Gladstone Institutes and University of CaliforniaSan Francisco UCSF shed new light on exactly how neurons the cells that send electrical signals through the brain consume and metabolise glucose as well as how these cells adapt to glucose shortagesWe already knew that the brain requires a lot of glucose but it had been unclear how much neurons themselves rely on glucose and what methods they use to break the sugar down said Ken Nakamura Associate Investigator at Gladstone a USbased nonprofit research organisationNow we have a much better understanding of the basic fuel that makes neurons runPast studies have established that the brains uptake of glucose is decreased in the early stages of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimers and ParkinsonsThe new findings published in the journal Cell Reports could lead to the discovery of new therapeutic approaches for those diseases and contribute to a better understanding of how to keep the brain healthy as it agesScientists have long debated what happens to glucose in the brain and many have suggested that neurons themselves dont metabolise the sugar They instead proposed that glial cells consume most of the glucose and then fuel neurons indirectly by passing them a metabolic product of glucose called lactateHowever the evidence to support this theory has been scantNakamuras experiment using induced pluripotent stem cells iPS cells to generate pure human neurons revealed that neurons themselves were capable of taking up the glucose and of processing it into smaller metabolitesFurther they used CRISPR gene editing to determine exactly how neurons were using the products of metabolised glucoseThey found one of the proteins enables neurons to import glucose and the other is required for glycolysis the main pathway by which cells typically metabolise glucose Removing either of these proteins stopped the breakdown of glucose in the isolated human neuronsThis is the most direct and clearest evidence yet that neurons are metabolising glucose through glycolysis and that they need this fuel to maintain normal energy levels said Nakamura who is also an Associate Professor in the Department of neurology at UCSFBy engineering the mices neurons to lack the proteins required for glucose import and glycolysis the team learnt how the animals develop severe learning and memory problems as they ageAlso ReadTips to get your skin ready to beat the summer heatThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever