People who develop Parkinson’s disease before age 50 may have been born with disordered brain cells that went undetected for decades, according to new Cedars-Sinai research. The research points to a drug that potentially might help correct these disease processes.
To perform the study, the research team generated special stem cells, known as induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), from cells of patients with young-onset Parkinson’s disease. The investigators also used their iPSC model to test a number of drugs that might reverse the abnormalities they had observed. They found that that one drug, PEP005, which is already approved by the Food and Drug Administration for treating precancers of the skin, reduced the elevated levels of alpha-synuclein in both the dopamine neurons in the dish and in laboratory mice.
Read more at: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200127134825.htm