New research published in the last week provides further experimental support for numerous clinical trials currently being conducted, including one by the biotech company Sanofi Genzyme.
Researchers have demonstrated that tiny proteins which usually reside on the outer wall of cells could be playing an important role in the protein clustering (or aggregation) that characterises Parkinson’s.
In today’s post we will look at this new research and discuss what it could mean for the on going clinical trials for Parkinson’s.
The proverb ‘When the cat is away, the mice will play’ has Latin origins.
Dum felis dormit, mus gaudet et exsi litantro (or ‘When the cat falls asleep, the mouse rejoices and leaps from the hole’)
It was also used in the early fourteenth century by the French: Ou chat na rat regne (‘Where there is no cat, the rat is king’).
And then Will Shakespeare used it in Henry the Fifth(1599), Act I, Scene II:
Westmoreland, speaking with King Henry V, Gloucester, Bedford, Exeter and Warwick
“But there’s a saying very old and true,
‘If that you will France win,
Then with Scotland first begin:’
For once the eagle England being in prey,
To her unguarded nest the weasel Scot
Comes sneaking and so sucks her princely eggs,
Playing the mouse in absence of the cat,
To tear and havoc more than she can eat”
Interesting. But what does any of this have to do with Parkinson’s?
Mitochondrial division inhibitor-1 (mdivi-1) is a small molecule drug that is demonstrating very impressive effects in preclinical models of Parkinson’s disease. With further research it could represent a potential future therapy for people with Parkinson’s disease, particularly those with genetic mutations affecting the mitochondria in their cells.
What are mitochondria?
In this post, we will explain what mitochondria are, how they may be involved in Parkinson’s disease, and we will discuss what the results of new research mean for future therapeutic strategies.
Mitochondria are fascinating.
Utterly. Utterly. Fascinating.
On the most basic level, Mitochondria (mitochondrion, singular; from the Greek words mitos (thread) and chondros (granule)) are just tiny little bean-shaped structures within the cells in our body, and their primary function is to act as the power stations. They supply the bulk of energy that cells require to keep the lights on. This chemical form of energy produced by the mitochondria is called adenosine triphosphate (or ATP). Lots of mitochondria are required in each cell to help keep the cell alive (as is shown in the image below, which is showing just the mitochondria (red) and the nucleus (blue) of several cells).
Lots of mitochondria (red) inside cells (nucleus in blue). Source: Clonetech
That’s the basic stuff – the general definition you will find in most text books on biology.
But let me ask you this:
How on earth did mitochondria come to be inside each cell and playing such a fundamental role?
I don’t know. Are you going to tell me?
Because we simply don’t know.
But understand this: Mitochondria are intruders.