Binge Drinking May Cause Alzheimer's Disease -- and It Might Strike Younger and in a Severe Form

Researchers at the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research in New York are investigating how excessive alcohol consumption leads to Alzheimer's disease, reports Medical Xpress . It is based on the suspicion that binge drinking contributes to the alteration of tau protein into a biological rogue prevalent in Alzheimer's disease. The scientists are exploring how tau can become phosphorylated with binge drinking. "It has been reported that alcohol consumption correlates with Alzheimer's-like cortical atrophy in individuals at high risk of developing the disease as well as younger age of onset," said Feinstein Institutes Professor Max Brenner. "In addition, chronic alcohol exposure caused neural tau phosphorylation in the hippocampus and memory-impairment in Alzheimer's-predisposed mice." The researchers hope their investigation will yield insights on specific proteins that apparently play key roles in the spread of tau, by analyzing the activities of cold-inducible RNA-binding protein (CIRP) and its associated configuration, extracellular cold-inducible RNA-binding protein (eCIRP). eCIRP plays a critical role in mediating memory impairment induced by exposure to excessive alcohol consumption.