A FAULTY 鈥渉ousekeeping鈥� gene damages nerves by allowing rubbish to pile up
inside cells, say researchers in Japan.
The brain cells of people with neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson鈥檚
or Alzheimer鈥檚 often accumulate bits of non-degraded proteins, and physicians
have long suspected that this cellular trash might damage neurons.
Now Keiji Wada of the National Institute of Neuroscience in Tokyo and his
colleagues have found that mice with neural degeneration have a mutant form of a
gene called gad (Nature Genetics, vol 23, p 47). Gad
normally codes for an enzyme needed to produce a protein that tags cellular
garbage for removal. 鈥淲e are going to investigate how this mutant enzyme damages
cells,鈥� says Wada.
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