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Volume 08 Journal of Alzheimers Disease & Parkinsonism Alzheimer's Congress 2018
May 30-31, 2018
Page 29
Notes:
conferenceseries.com
May 30-31, 2018 Osaka, Japan
10th World Congress on
Alzheimer's Disease & Dementia
Hydromethylthionine: Potential of a single drug for multiple neurodegenerative protein aggregation
disorders
Following our discovery of a fragment from the repeat domain of τ-protein as a structural constituent of the PHF-core in
alzheimer’s disease, we developed an assay that captured several key features of the aggregation process. τ-τ u binding through
the core τ fragment can be blocked by variants of the Methyl Thioninium (MT) moiety found to dissolve proteolytically stable
PHFs isolated from AD brain. The PHF-core tau fragment induces templated proteolytic processing of normal τ, is inherently
capable of auto-catalytic self-propagation, can be assembled into characteristic PHFs in vitro and assembly can be blocked by
MT-like compounds. The potential utility of these compounds for reduction of pathology and reversal of behavioural deficits
was confirmed in tau transgenic mouse models using a stable reduced form of the molecule (hydromethylthionine) which is
better absorbed and tolerated. Similar benefits have been shown in a synucein aggregation assay in vitro and in a transgenic
synuclein mouse model. These findings led to the first clinical trials to test hydromethylthionine therapy in alzheimer’s
disease as a way to block this cascade. Although hydromethylthionine appears to be beneficial as monotherapy, there is a
negative interaction with standard symptomatic treatments for AD which was has now been confirmed in a τ transgenic
mouse model. In clinical practice, hydromethylthionine therapy will be optimally useful as first-line monotherapy. The efficacy
of hydromethylthionine as a synuclein aggregation inhibitor suggests that it may also be useful in parkinson’s disease and
dementia of the lewy body type.
Biography
Claude M Wischik has completed his Medical degree at Flinders University in South Australia and PhD at the University of Cambridge, UK. He is the Professor of
Psychiatric Geratology at the University of Aberdeen and Chairman of TauRx Therapeutics. He has published extensively on the τ-pathology of AD.
Claude MWischik
University of Aberdeen, UK
Claude M Wischik, J Alzheimers Dis Parkinsonism 2018, Volume 8
DOI: 10.4172/2161-0460-C4-044