VIENNA, Sept. 22 (Xinhua) -- Researchers from the Medical University of Vienna in Austria have found that Parkinson's disease spreads in the brain from cell to cell similar to the way an infection does, Der Standard newspaper reported Monday.
The team led by Gabor Kovacs said they are now able to show how, with the use of a specially-developed antibody, spreading of the disease occurs in the human brain. This had previously only been observed in experimental models, but is now for the first time also observable in humans.
The focus of the research was on the protein Alpha-synuclein that is abundant in the human brain. In patients with Parkinson's disease (and the closely-associated Lewy body dementia) the protein appears in a pathologically-altered state.
The study showed how human nerve cells absorbed the pathologically-altered form of the protein and how it was thus transmitted from one cell to the next.
"This explains why in the course of the disease the state of patients continues to become worse and new symptoms appear -- because the 'contagion' process can spread the disease to other regions of the brain," Kovacs was reported as saying.
Kovacs said blocking the spreading mechanism of the Alpha-synuclein protein could now be targeted as a means of therapy for patients, and additionally the antibody could be used to aid in making diagnoses of both Parkinson's disease and Lewy body dementia.
The announcement from the team supports similar claims from Munich-based neuropathologist Armin Giese, who reported similar behaviour with Alzheimer's disease, on Tuesday last week.
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