Category Archives: Parkinson’s Treatment

Oper Technology, a Hong Kong biotechnology start-up, has pioneered what it claims is a world first in stem cell treatment that it says could potentially help millions of patients suffering from Alzheimers and Parkinsons diseases. The business was co-founded by Hong Kong Baptist Universitys Professor Ken Yung, who specialises in neurobiology and neurological diseases in the universitys biology department. He and his team has now developed a method of harvesting neural stem cells from the brains of live subjects using specially developed nanoparticles. The exploration of using stem cells to repair damaged neural cells is not a new concept. Scientists in the US and elsewhere have experimented using stem cells from fat and skin, developing them into neural cells. But Yung claims his team is the first to successfully harvest stem cells directly from the brain and re-inject the developed neural cells back into a live subject, thereby artificially regenerating any cells which have died off, due to neurological diseases from neural stem cells themselves. Stem cells have the potential to develop into different types of cells with specialised functions. The nanoparticles which are made of a type of iron oxide work like magnets to attract the stem cells within … Continue reading →

Monday, June 12, 2017 2:58 p.m. EDT By Gene Emery (Reuters Health) - An experimental extended-release version of the drug amantadine can reduce the duration of the involuntary dancing-like movements seen in people whose long-term use of levodopa has kept their Parkinsons disease under control. The results may help doctors walk a tightrope in treating the tremors and muscle rigidity of Parkinson's itself, where the beneficial effects of levodopa wane over time, producing so-called "off" times. Efforts to shorten the off times by increasing the levodopa dose lead to the other unwanted movements, a condition known as levodopa-induced dyskinesia (LID). LID arises in more than half of Parkinson's patients who have taken levodopa for four to six years and in more than 90 percent of patients who have been on the drug for a decade. The disease itself affects nearly a million people in the U.S., according to the Parkinson's Disease Foundation. In the new study, when 58 patients were given placebo for 12 weeks, they improved by 8.0 points on a test designed to measure their symptoms that has a maximum score of 104. But for the 63 people on extended-release amantadine, the improvement was 15.9 points. And when … Continue reading →

Pig brain cells could be the key to treating people with Parkinsons disease, according to early trials of a promising new treatment that implants the cells into a patients brain. Living Cell Technologies, the company that developed the technique, reports that four patients in New Zealand have shown significant improvement after undergoing the procedure 18 months ago. The procedure has already proven successful in rats. Parkinsons is a progressive neurological disease that slowly kills the brain cells that make dopamine, which helps control movement. Patients can take medicine to replace the dopamine but theres currently no cure or treatment to slow the diseases progression. More than 10 million people worldwide suffer from Parkinsons. The new treatment takes cells from a pigs choroid plexus and places them into tiny capsules which are then inserted into the patients brain. This region of the pigs brain hosts a mixture of chemicals that researchers hope will slow the onset of Parkinsons by keeping a humans dopamine-producing cells alive and well. The capsules are created out of an ingredient from seaweed that stops the brains immune cells from attacking the pig cells. The four patients each received 40 capsules in one side of their brain. … Continue reading →

The disease is caused by the gradual loss of dopamine-producing cells GJLP/Science Photo Library By Clare Wilson Would you have pig cells implanted in your brain? Some people with Parkinsons disease have, in the hope it will stop their disease progressing. The approach is still in the early stages of testing, but initial results from four people look promising, with all showing some improvement 18 months after surgery. People with Parkinsons disease, which causes tremors and difficulty moving, usually get worse over time. The disease is caused by the gradual loss of brain cells that make dopamine, a compound that helps control our movements. Current medicines replace the missing dopamine, but their effectiveness wears off over the years. So Living Cell Technologies, based in Auckland, New Zealand, has been developing a treatment that uses cells from the choroid plexus in pigs. This brain structure makes a cocktail of growth factors and signalling molecules known to help keep nerve cells healthy. Last month, surgery was completed on a further 18 people in a placebo-controlled trial, using the choroid plexus cell implants. The hope is that compounds made by these cells will nourish the remaining dopamine-producing cells in the patients brains, slowing … Continue reading →

Californian biotech firm Adamas Pharmaceuticals has presented updated efficacy and tolerability data To continue reading this article and to access exclusive features, interviews, round-ups and commentary from the sharpest minds in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology space you need to be logged into the site and have an active subscription or trial subscription. Please loginorsubscribe in order to continue reading. Claim a week's trial subscriptionby signing up for free today and receive our daily pharma and biotech news bulletin free of charge, forever. Adamas PharmaceuticalsADS-5102Drug TrialNeurologicalPharmaceuticalResearchUSA Access The Pharma Letter's latest news free for 7 days PLUS... you can receive the Pharma Letter headlines and news roundup email free forever Click here to take a free trial Unlimited access to The Pharma Letter site for a whole year Only 77 per month or 820 per year Click here to subscribe The rest is here: Adamas provides updated results from pivotal Parkinson's study - The Pharma Letter (registration) … Continue reading →

New York Times Patient Voices: Parkinson's Disease New York Times Parkinson's disease, which affects more than 10 million people worldwide, is a neurological disorder that occurs as a result of the death of nerve cells in the brain that produce dopamine. The loss of dopamine production in the brain can lead to ... Read this article: Patient Voices: Parkinson's Disease - New York Times … Continue reading →

Jian Feng, PhD, is senior author on a paper published in Cell Reports about research results that show potential screening methods for drugs to treat Parkinsons disease. Researchers working with stem cells have reproduced in a petri dish the brain oscillations that characterize Parkinsons disease. The research could pave the way for faster screenings for new treatments or even a cure for the disease. With this new finding, we can now generate in a dish the neuronal misfiring that is similar to what occurs in the brain of a Parkinsons patient, said Jian Feng, PhD, senior author on the paper and professor of physiology and biophysics. A variety of studies and drug discovery efforts can be implemented on these human neurons to speed up the discovery of a cure for Parkinsons disease. The work provides a useful platform for better understanding the molecular mechanisms at work in the disease, said Feng. Abnormal oscillations in neurons that control movement, which likely cause the tremors that characterize Parkinsons disease, have long been reported in patients with the disease. The oscillations first came to light decades ago when some Parkinsons patients began undergoing deep brain stimulation as treatment once their medications ceased to … Continue reading →

A multi-national team of researchers has developed a method of non-invasively stimulating regions deep within the brain, an advance that could improve the treatment of Parkinsons disease. The new technique, developed by MIT researchers, collaborating with investigators at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), Boston, and the ITIS Foundation in Switzerland, sees electrodes placed onto the scalp, which has the potential to make deep brain stimulation less risky, less expensive, and more accessible. Traditional deep brain stimulation requires opening the skull and implanting an electrode, which can have complications, said Ed Boyden, an associate professor of biological engineering and brain and cognitive sciences at MIT, and the senior author of the study, which appears in Cell. Secondly, only a small number of people can do this kind of neurosurgery. Deep brain stimulation is used also to treat some patients with obsessive compulsive disorder, epilepsy, and depression, and are exploring the possibility of using it to treat other conditions such as autism. The new, non-invasive approach could make it easier to adapt deep brain stimulation to treat additional disorders, the researchers said. Current treatments are severely limited for the 127,000 people living with Parkinsons in the UK With the ability to … Continue reading →

Published time: 31 May, 2017 17:14 A newly discovered enzyme, found in a fungus used to make soy sauce, could be key to cheaper and more efficient Parkinsons Disease drugs, according to new research. Scientists at the Universities of Manchester and York found the enzyme in Aspergillus oryzae a fungus commonly used to ferment soybeans for sauce. The enzyme, RedAm, could boost monoamine oxidase (MOA) inhibitors used to help Parkinson's sufferers by reducing some of the associated motor symptoms, according to the study published in Nature Chemistry. There is currently no cure for Parkinson's. Around 1 million people in the US live with the degenerative disorder, according to the Parkinsons Disease Foundation. The new biocatalyst will have a positive impact on the costings and manpower needed to produce chiral amines, key to the fight against the disease, according to a statement from the University of Manchester. This is a very exciting discovery from both a chemistry and pharmaceutical perspective, Nick Turner, Professor of Chemical Biology from the Manchester Institute of Biotechnology (MIB) said. It is the first enzyme of its kind that has these properties and has the potential to improve the production of this and other important drugs. Some … Continue reading →

May 31, 2017 Immunohistochemistry for alpha-synuclein showing positive staining (brown) of an intraneural Lewy-body in the Substantia nigra in Parkinson's disease. Credit: Wikipedia Scientists have discovered a new enzyme that will make a drug used to treat Parkinson's disease cheaper and quicker to produce. Researchers at the Universities of Manchester and York found the enzyme in Aspergillus oryzae, a kind of fungus used for making soy sauce. The discovery, 'A reductive aminase from Aspergillus oryzae' was published in Nature Chemistry. The enzyme's greatest impact could be in a class of medications called monoamine oxidase (MAO) inhibitors. One such example of this kind of drug is Rasagiline. Rasagiline helps Parkinson sufferers by increasing a substance in the brain that affects motor function. These substances help reduce the involuntary tremors that are associated with the condition. The medicine works in both early and advanced Parkinson's, and is especially useful in dealing with non-motor symptoms of the condition, like fatigue. The team, led by Professor Nick Turner, Professor of Chemical Biology from the Manchester Institute of Biotechnology (MIB), have identified a new biocatalyst (RedAm) that accelerates a process called reductive amination. Reductive amination is one of the most important methods for the synthesis … Continue reading →