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Alzheimers Disease: A Novel Hypothesis Integrating Spirochetes, Biofilm, and the Immune System
| Herbert B. Allen*, Diego Morales, Krister Jones and Suresh Joshi | |
| Drexel University College of Medicine, Philadelphia, USA | |
| *Corresponding Author : | Herbert B. Allen Drexel University College of Medicine Philadelphia, USA Tel: 2157625550 Fax: 215 7625570 E-mail: Herbert.Allen@drexelmed.edu |
| Received December 01, 2015; Accepted December 30, 2015; Published January 02, 2016 | |
| Citation: Allen HB, Morales D, Jones K, Joshi S (2016) Alzheimer’s Disease: A Novel Hypothesis Integrating Spirochetes, Biofilm, and the Immune System. J Neuroinfect Dis 7:200. doi:10.4172/2314-7326.1000200 | |
| Copyright: © 2016 Allen HB, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. | |
| Related article at Pubmed, Scholar Google | |
Abstract
In the light of recent studies showing the presence of spirochetes in the brains of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) patients, we have studied (post mortem) the hippocampus region in the brains of similarly affected AD patients utilizing both pathology and immunohistochemistry. Our findings demonstrate that the plaques, which are characteristically found in AD brains, reveal the presence of biofilms. These biofilms are undoubtedly made by the spirochetes present there; further, we have also found that the biofilms co-localize with the β amyloid that is a signature finding in the disease. Also, we have shown activation of Toll-like receptor 2 in the same areas. We postulate this is related to the disease because this innate immune system molecule cannot penetrate the biofilm to destroy the spirochetes present there, so, inasmuch as it is activated, it destroys the surrounding tissue instead. We compare this destruction to that which is caused by activation of the adaptive immune system, which leads to much more severe devastation, much more rapidly.
