Feb 9 2024University of North Carolina Health Care UNC School of Medicine researcher Sarah Cohen, PhD, and Ian Windham, a former PhD student from the Cohen lab, have made a new discovery about apolipoprotein E – the biggest genetic risk factor for late-onset Alzheimer's disease.
"We discovered that brain cells known as astrocytes are more vulnerable to damage and may even go dysfunctional when APOE4 surrounds their lipid storage centers," said Cohen, assistant professor of cell biology and physiology and senior author on the paper published in the Journal of Cell Biology. "This mechanism could explain why exactly APOE4 increases one's risk of Alzheimer's on the cellular level.
If astrocytes were to become damaged or dysfunctional in any way, they cannot perform their cleaning duties. As a result, other brain cells, called microglia, cannot clean up amyloid beta plaques in the brain either, another driving factor for Alzheimer's disease.