Harvard researchers plot early attack against Alzheimer’s
First in an occasional series on how Harvard researchers are tackling the problematic issues of aging. Catch it early. Those are watchwords in the battle against a host of illnesses, from heart disease to cancer to Type 2 diabetes. Early detection gives physicians a chance to minimize damage, to insert a stent and keep blood flowing to the heart, to remove a tumor before one becomes many, to urge crucial lifestyle changes: lose weight, eat better, exercise. But can the strategy work for Alzheimer’s disease? Scientists are starting to think it might. The Harvard Aging Brain Study, now in its seventh year, has shown that amyloid beta, the protein thought to cause Alzheimer’s, accumulates in the brain a decade or more before symptoms occur. That finding has given new hope to researchers struggling to move beyond a rash of high-profile Alzheimer’s failures in clinical drug trials. In February, drug maker Merck & Co. halted a...