kaylee
09-27-2002, 09:02 AM
It's a shame that our government decided in 1974 that no further research could be conducted on the Cannabis plant (due to the war they had declared on marijuana), except with their permission... And their permission has been very hard to get unless you are a pharmaceutical company that doesn't want marijuana legal anyway (estimates are that they would lose 20% of their profits immediately because patients who use marijuana use less chemical medications).
My mother suffered with Alzheimers. Her quality of life could have been greatly improved if the USA had done the research other countries are doing.
Damn this drug war!
Kay Lee
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,3605,798760,00.html
High times for Alzheimer's
Sophie Petit-Zeman on the way cannabinoids could alleviate symptoms of degenerative diseases
Thursday September 26, 2002
The Guardian
'A younger sibling of mine accidentally let grandma eat the wrong brownies...
You could tell she had AD [Alzheimer's disease] but nothing so prominent. It was like it took her back 3-4 years."
Postings such as this one on the Alzforum website intrigued Dr Nathaniel Milton, a biochemist at London's Royal Free and
University College medical school.
He was already actively researching compounds which prevent the brain cell death that occurs in Alzheimer's disease, and, with research partner Insight Biotechnology, had taken out patents on some capable of doing this. He was also aware of a few reports suggesting that cannabis preparations, in the hands of doctors, could do for their patients much of what the brownies did for grandma.
The brain of an Alzheimer's sufferer contains abnormal deposits called "tangles" and "plaques." Associated with these deposits are proteins, or bits of them, called tau
and amyloid-beta (Aß) respectively. Healthy tau plays a structural role in brain cells, but there is good evidence that in Alzheimer's disease, it becomes festooned with atoms of phosphorus and oxygen, like lights on a Christmas tree.
It is thought to be this that tips tau into tangles. Milton has evidence that something similar happens to Aß in plaques, and that this, in turn, makes it toxic to brain cells.
In research to be published in the journal Neuroscience Letters, and which he will also present at next month's neurobiology of aging conference in Florida, he reports that cannabinoids - cannabis-like compounds that occur naturally
in the brain - can stop Aß killing cells.
"My basic hypothesis," he says, "is that Aß is taken up into neurons, where it is phophorylated [garlanded, like tau, with phosphorus and oxygen] and kills them. It's this toxic action that cannabinoids prevent."
Milton discovered this by incubating human neurons in culture, and then poisoning them with Aß. When he added cannabinoids to the brew, Aß was apparently no longer
toxic.
Milton describes a complex "protective signalling pathway inside neurons" that he thinks is activated by the cannabinoids.
Other compounds with similar properties do exist, and one of particular interest is corticotrophin releasing hormone (CRH). Like cannabinoids, CRH is made within the brain and is reportedly reduced in people with Alzheimer's disease.
This is of particular interest to Milton because, he says: "If it turns out that reduced CRH is fundamental to the disease process, then the brain may be losing one of its innate
protective mechanisms.
People with high natural levels of cannabinoids in their brains might then be protected against Alzheimer's disease."
And the next question follows like, well, smoke after lighting up: Are we set to see a generation, or indeed generations, of cannabis smokers immune to Alzheimer's disease?
Milton says not, because his research shows not only the ability of cannabinoids to protect against brain cell death in Alzheimer's disease, but also that too much of them is toxic.
Dr Richard Harvey, director of research at the Alzheimer's
Society, says: "There's no epidemiological data on whether exposure to cannabis in humans affects the risk of developing dementia, and it may be difficult to collect such
data."
But Harvey calls Milton's research "very interesting", adding that: "Clearly in the test tube, cannabinoids have the ability to block at least one of the probable causal mechanisms in Alzheimer's disease and so become a potential treatment or preventative agent that needs to be tested in humans."
Shared by Kay Lee
Making The Walls Transparent
http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/starke
My mother suffered with Alzheimers. Her quality of life could have been greatly improved if the USA had done the research other countries are doing.
Damn this drug war!
Kay Lee
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,3605,798760,00.html
High times for Alzheimer's
Sophie Petit-Zeman on the way cannabinoids could alleviate symptoms of degenerative diseases
Thursday September 26, 2002
The Guardian
'A younger sibling of mine accidentally let grandma eat the wrong brownies...
You could tell she had AD [Alzheimer's disease] but nothing so prominent. It was like it took her back 3-4 years."
Postings such as this one on the Alzforum website intrigued Dr Nathaniel Milton, a biochemist at London's Royal Free and
University College medical school.
He was already actively researching compounds which prevent the brain cell death that occurs in Alzheimer's disease, and, with research partner Insight Biotechnology, had taken out patents on some capable of doing this. He was also aware of a few reports suggesting that cannabis preparations, in the hands of doctors, could do for their patients much of what the brownies did for grandma.
The brain of an Alzheimer's sufferer contains abnormal deposits called "tangles" and "plaques." Associated with these deposits are proteins, or bits of them, called tau
and amyloid-beta (Aß) respectively. Healthy tau plays a structural role in brain cells, but there is good evidence that in Alzheimer's disease, it becomes festooned with atoms of phosphorus and oxygen, like lights on a Christmas tree.
It is thought to be this that tips tau into tangles. Milton has evidence that something similar happens to Aß in plaques, and that this, in turn, makes it toxic to brain cells.
In research to be published in the journal Neuroscience Letters, and which he will also present at next month's neurobiology of aging conference in Florida, he reports that cannabinoids - cannabis-like compounds that occur naturally
in the brain - can stop Aß killing cells.
"My basic hypothesis," he says, "is that Aß is taken up into neurons, where it is phophorylated [garlanded, like tau, with phosphorus and oxygen] and kills them. It's this toxic action that cannabinoids prevent."
Milton discovered this by incubating human neurons in culture, and then poisoning them with Aß. When he added cannabinoids to the brew, Aß was apparently no longer
toxic.
Milton describes a complex "protective signalling pathway inside neurons" that he thinks is activated by the cannabinoids.
Other compounds with similar properties do exist, and one of particular interest is corticotrophin releasing hormone (CRH). Like cannabinoids, CRH is made within the brain and is reportedly reduced in people with Alzheimer's disease.
This is of particular interest to Milton because, he says: "If it turns out that reduced CRH is fundamental to the disease process, then the brain may be losing one of its innate
protective mechanisms.
People with high natural levels of cannabinoids in their brains might then be protected against Alzheimer's disease."
And the next question follows like, well, smoke after lighting up: Are we set to see a generation, or indeed generations, of cannabis smokers immune to Alzheimer's disease?
Milton says not, because his research shows not only the ability of cannabinoids to protect against brain cell death in Alzheimer's disease, but also that too much of them is toxic.
Dr Richard Harvey, director of research at the Alzheimer's
Society, says: "There's no epidemiological data on whether exposure to cannabis in humans affects the risk of developing dementia, and it may be difficult to collect such
data."
But Harvey calls Milton's research "very interesting", adding that: "Clearly in the test tube, cannabinoids have the ability to block at least one of the probable causal mechanisms in Alzheimer's disease and so become a potential treatment or preventative agent that needs to be tested in humans."
Shared by Kay Lee
Making The Walls Transparent
http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/starke