THERE’S a striking similarity between the proteins involved in prion diseases
and those in Alzheimer’s, claim chemists in China.
For years, researchers have been intrigued by the apparent similarities
between Alzheimer’s and prion diseases. Both exist in sporadic and inherited
forms and both involve abnormal brain proteins that clump together to form
amyloid plaques that riddle the brain.
Now Chi Ming Yang and colleagues at Nankai University in Tianjin have found a
shared pattern in the sequences of two proteins that play a key role in these
diseases. Both have a pattern of one reductive amino acid—which is more…
