Posted on 06/14/2021 9:08:40 AM PDT by Red Badger
Plaque with iron (l) and copper (r, in pink) (Everett, et al., Science Advances, 2021)
================================================================================
Set aside every scrap of iron inside a human body and you might have enough to fashion a nail or two. As for copper, you'd be lucky to extract just enough to make a small earring.
Scarce as they are, these two metals are necessary for our survival, playing essential roles in human growth and metabolism. But one place we wouldn't expect to find either is clumped inside our brain cells.
However, for people with the neurodegenerative disorder Alzheimer's disease, something seems to be turning these elements into microscopic ingots.
A team of researchers from the US and UK spotted the tell-tale glint of copper and iron in their elemental forms using a form of X-ray microscopy (STXM) on samples of neural plaques taken from the frontal and temporal lobes of Alzheimer's patients.
Plaques are a typical feature of this particular form of dementia, made up of proteins broken down into what's known as beta-amyloid.
Yet therapies focused on clearing clumps of beta-amyloid from the brain haven't led us much closer to a treatment for Alzheimer's, leaving researchers wondering what role – if any – they play in the disease's progress.
Ongoing research has continued to build a picture surrounding the biology that could be responsible for the plaques, with researchers looking at their formation and taste for destruction from every angle.
One angle that hasn't been fully explored is the toxic effect of biomineralization, or the accumulation of minerals such as hematite in brain cells.
Trapped as a charged ionic form inside hemoglobin, iron is a handy way to transport oxygen around the body. And few places are as desperate for oxygen as the human brain.
Once released from its protein shackles, however, iron shows its nasty side as what's known as its labile form, generating reactive species of oxygen that wreak havoc on delicate biochemistry and destroying cells.
High levels of labile iron have been linked to neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer's before. Similarly, copper is another mineral typically shielded safely in a protein, yet thoroughly capable of making a mess of our brains in labile form.
To build a bigger picture of how these two metals might be involved in dementia, a research team led by scientists from Keele University in the UK hunted for signs of iron and copper inside resin-embedded amyloid plaque cores donated by two Alzheimer's patients.
The X-rays the research team used to analyze the plaques allowed them to get a feel for the clumps' size and shape while also revealing the identity of the minerals they contained.
Not only did they spot accumulations of iron and copper, but these metals were in elemental forms, essentially forming tiny deposits buried deep inside the amyloid plaques. What's more, the team could tell a few things about the metals' ability to react with other substances.
Although in a relatively unreactive state and barely a fraction of a micrometer wide, the surfaces of these nuggets wouldn't be all that stable, posing a risk of reverting to hostile forms that could react and cause damage to the surrounding neuron.
With signs of these ionized states spotted near the nuggets, there's every reason to suspect they could well be playing a role in inflammation and even death of the cells.
Aggregations of iron as the magnetic mineral magnetite have been found previously in bacteria and a few other species of animal. They've also been found previously in post-mortems of human brain tissue.
But this is the first time anybody has uncovered tiny pieces of copper in elemental form inside human neurons.
Exactly what it means will depend on what future studies find. Even if it doesn't present a new pathway for treatment, it just might offer insight into ways to diagnose Alzheimer's even earlier or tease apart the different ways it might progress.
With the prevalence of the disease set to rise with the expansion of our world's aging population, understanding how Alzheimer's develops is becoming more important than ever.
We'll need every nugget of information we can get our hands on, no matter how small.
This research was published in Science Advances.
If you eat chocolste or meat, I suggest you donate blood once every two years. I think that’s unlikely to cause a deficiency.
If you get a blood test for iron stores, you will know more precisely how much you can reduce iron without causing a deficiency.
Groups at higher risk of getting severe covid have higher amount of iron stores.
This is very interesting...I did some research 15yrs or so ago
involving very strong pulsed magnetic fields in the range of 2T-5T applied very close to the cranium.
The magnetic strength was similar to the strength of the static magnetic field of MRI machines. The short pulses induced tiny currents in brain matter, the static field of
an MRI does not do that since the field is not varying.
These minuscule traces of iron may have been a factor in the results. It was not known at the time, at least it was not understood that iron might exist in this magnitude in the tissues.
Around the same time studies were being conducted using strong ultrasonic pulses to see if that could fracture neural plaque...
I hope that someday soon research will yield viable treatments for the scourge that is Alzheimer’s, I will
always remember witnessing my Grandmothers slow destruction from this horrifying disease :-/
A penny for your thoughts.
It’s a dime, now. Inflation.....................
I was once a CAT Scanner tech.............................
I remember when the CAT scan equipment was so expensive that it was housed in tractor-trailer rigs and would be driven from Hospital to Hospital to do scans.
Now tinkerers over on HackADay make simple CAT scan equipment at home :-)
https://hackaday.com/2019/02/20/diy-x-ray-machine-becomes-ct-scanner/
Actually that was a response to a GOVERNMENT ‘rule’.
The government, in its infinite stupidity, dictated that the hospitals could not buy a CAT Scan if there was one within , IIRC 200 miles. This was to ‘keep costs down’ or so they claimed at the time.
It actually drove costs up.
The ‘law’ was supported by GE, then the major manufacturer of CAT Scanners at the time.
Surprise, surprise, surprise...............
The mobile units were to get around that edict by saying the hospitals were renting the machines, not buying them...................
Aluminum pots and pans were just awful! I remember once on a camping trip I tried to fry an egg in a small aluminum skillet...I ended up with about a teaspoon full of egg..the rest was permanently affixed to the pan :-( Even cooking oil sticks to those damned aluminum pans!
A very technical document at this link but there is a very defined connection between increased uptake of Aluminum and it’s impact on Iron assimilation and connection to Alzheimers. Amyloid plaque that encases the brain has ben referred to as a defensive response as all of the blood at some time passes through it and excessive accumulation of Iron to me is a “tell” that something else is going on in the body
Go to pages 25-26 for an initial conclusion that will open your eyes I hope, but to me in my research and work in caregiving and Elderly population maladies points at the increase in use and absorption of Aluminum (acid reflux meds including antacid OTC products) is a key element
https://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/handle/10125/10527/uhm_ms_3947_r.pdf?sequence=1
Look at the label....contains Phosphoric acid
Used widely in the semi-conductor and flat panel industries to etch aluminum.
I used a ton of maalox in the 80s
Worked at an RC Cola bottling plant in the 1980’s and every once in a while, a bottle would break on a pallet. Pull the pallet out to clean and the finish of the concrete floor was taken off. The warehouse was dotted with hundreds of spots.
Bkmk.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.