Inflammation in the Brain Linked to Several Forms of Dementia

A study from the University of Cambridge in Brain suggests inflammation in the brain may contribute more to certain dementias than previously assumed, reports Medical Xpress . The authors enlisted 31 participants with three different varieties of frontotemporal dementia (FTD), who received brain scans to detect inflammation and abnormal "junk" proteins. The researchers determined that across the brain, and in all three FTD types, greater inflammation in each brain region correlates with more harmful accumulation of junk proteins. "We predicted the link between inflammation in the brain and the build-up of damaging proteins, but even we were surprised by how tightly these two problems mapped on to each other," said Cambridge's Thomas Cope. Cambridge's Richard Bevan Jones suggested that "there may be a vicious circle where cell damage triggers inflammation, which in turn leads to further cell damage." According to Cambridge Professor James Rowe, the findings also imply "that inflammation is part of many other neurodegenerative diseases, including Parkinson's disease and Huntington's disease. This offers hope that immune-based treatments might help slow or prevent these conditions."