Remarkable Results from a Drug That Treats Neurodegeneration in Alzheimer’s disease

I wrote an article recently (https://wp.me/p4ztmz-1wc) about how fisetin, a flavonoid found in strawberries and other fruits and vegetables, blocks pathways that allow Alzheimer’s disease (AD) to grow and thrive. Further study shows that a drug has been developed based on one of the pathways for AD to develop and has been very successful in laboratory animals.

Alzheimer’s disease & CMS121

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/08/200804165119.htm. CMS121 is a developmental drug that has remarkable success in slowing the aging of brain cells. Studies were done with mice to determine the effectiveness of this drug in reversing AD symptoms.

Our brains metabolize lipids – fatty molecules. The process involves several pathways. Fisetin blocks lipid peroxidation – the oxidation of lipids in the brain. By tweaking the fisetin molecule, scientists developed different variants of it – as we often see with coronavirus (Alpha, Beta, Delta, and now the Omicron variant).

CMS121 was found to improve mice memory and reduce the degeneration of brain cells. Clinical trials have just started. https://www.technologynetworks.com/drug-discovery/news/investigational-alzheimers-drug-cms121-begins-phase-i-clinical-testing-354533

The Study

https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S2213231720308533?token=3106568621DCBC07F8B09C0AA5C722DDC4328CB3D2B25BC089EA24118E94E2068AB0A1913EF6601BA2A8FA79751212C5&originRegion=us-east-1&originCreation=20211231190700. Two primary contributors to AD are beta-amyloid plaques and tau tangles. Fisetin does not disrupt the pathways to those end factors. However, many factors or pathways lead to AD—some symptoms of AD result from neurodegeneration.

CMS121 uses the mother molecule to delve further into the lipid peroxidation of fats in the brain. The July 2020 journal of Redox Biology published a study demonstrating the reversal of neurodegeneration in mice models.

Mice were divided into three groups – healthy and two groups that had developed AD. One group of AD mice were treated with CMS121, and the other was not.

At nine months, mice have equivalent aging as middle age in humans. Several tests were done with the mice to determine memory and behavior. One group of the AD-induced mice was treated with CMS121, and the other was not. Three months later, testing was repeated. Included in this group were healthy mice.

The AD-induced mice treated with CMS121 performed as well as the healthy mice. However, the non-treated AD-induced mice performed more poorly.

Conclusion

The brains of the three mouse groups were studied for lipid accumulation and differentiation. Lipid peroxidation creates free radicals – molecules with unstable electron structures that rip electrons off neighboring molecules, causing inflammation. Left untreated, cellular inflammation can cause cell damage.

The health mice and those AD-induced mice treated with CMS121 had lower levels of lipid peroxidation. CMS121 had altered the biological advancement of lipid peroxidation caused by AD development by lowering levels of fatty acid synthetase (FASN). https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2213231720308533

Clinical tests are underway, and this may open a whole new field of treatment that can reduce symptoms of AD, especially early-onset AD.

Live Longer & Enjoy Life! – Red O’Laughlin – RedOLaughlin.com