Most people think of brain aging as something vague that shows up when you forget a name or walk into a room and lose your train of thought. Behind those everyday slips, though, are real physical changes slowly unfolding inside your neurons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now a team of scientists says they have found a molecular \u201cmaster switch\u201d that appears to control a big part of that process in human brain cells. By dialing down a protein called OTULIN<\/a>, they were able to shut off production of tau, a sticky protein that builds up in Alzheimer\u2019s disease<\/a> and other dementias, and even erase it from lab-grown neurons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tau<\/a> is a protein that normally acts like scaffolding inside nerve cells, helping stabilize tiny tubes that keep the cell\u2019s structure in shape and transport nutrients around. When tau becomes abnormal, it clumps together into tangles that choke off this internal transport system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These tangles are one of the classic hallmarks seen in Alzheimer\u2019s disease under the microscope, along with more than twenty related brain disorders grouped under the name tauopathies<\/a>. In many of these conditions, the spread of toxic tau across brain regions tracks closely with worsening memory loss and confusion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For years, much of the drug development work has tried to clean up tau after it has already formed clumps. What this new research suggests is a different strategy that goes closer to the source and tampers with the machinery that makes tau in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The new study was led by molecular geneticist Karthikeyan Tangavelou<\/a> at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, working with colleagues including Kiran Bhaskar and partners at the University of Tennessee. Their focus was OTULIN, an enzyme best known for removing specific molecular tags involved in immune signaling and inflammation.<\/p>\n\n\n\nTau and the slow aging of the brain<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Read More: These human footprints found in the desert of the United States are between 21,000 and 23,000 years old and are generating considerable controversy among archaeologists<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
OTULIN steps in as a master switch<\/h2>\n\n\n\n