| dietary exposure to an environmental toxin triggers neurofibrillary tangles and amyloid deposits in the brain. | neurofibrillary tangles (nft) and β-amyloid plaques are the neurological hallmarks of both alzheimer's disease and an unusual paralytic illness suffered by chamorro villagers on the pacific island of guam. many chamorros with the disease suffer dementia, and in some villages one-quarter of the adults perished from the disease. like alzheimer's, the causal factors of guamanian amyotrophic lateral sclerosis/parkinsonism dementia complex (als/pdc) are poorly understood. in replicated experiments, w ... | 2016 | 26791617 |
| creating a simian model of guam als/pdc which reflects chamorro lifetime bmaa exposures. | the theory that β-n-methylamino-l-alanine (bmaa), a cyanobacterial toxin, contaminates traditional food supplies of the chamorro people of guam is supported by the recent finding that chronic dietary exposure to l-bmaa in vervets (chlorocebus sabaeus) triggers the formation of neurofibrillary tangles (nft) and β-amyloid plaques in the brain. in the first experiment, we found that all four vervets receiving a 210 mg/kg dose for 140 days developed nft and sparse amyloid deposits. in the second exp ... | 2017 | 28478528 |