Monday Matters #25

       Alzheimers is a disease affecting 5 million Americans. Alzheimers affects the brains memory thought and thought. This disease usually occurs in people over the age of 60. However in recent studies, people as young as 20 are showing signs of the Alzheimer's protein. Prof. Geula and colleagues did a study on the brain cells of three groups of deceased people and compared the results: 13 people, age 20-66 were normal when they died, 16 people, age 70- 99 did not have dementia when they died, and 21 people age 60-95 who did have Alzheimers when they died. In their results, they found that the Alzheimers protein began growing throughout their lives starting from adulthood. they found that the bad proteins formed toxic clusters called amyloid oligomers. These were small in adults and large in older older adults. This research shows that the cells grew as time went on.