The following appeared in a recent issue of the FEAT Daily Newsletter

A new study led by North Carolina State University researchers has found that aluminum levels in the brains of laboratory mice decreased by 80 percent after the mice were given supplemental doses of a protein called peptide YY.

The sharp drop in aluminum levels occurred after injecting the mice with the protein supplements for just three days, says lead researcher Dr. Jim Croom, professor of nutrition and physiology at NC State.

Croom's team's findings may have important implications for research on Alzheimer's disease, Down syndrome and other conditions associated with elevated levels of aluminum in the brain.

"Scientists have long been searching for a safe, effective way to remove aluminum from the brain," he says. "If peptide YY is proved to work in humans as well as it has in mice, it could give us a new tool for studying the role of aluminum in diseases such as Alzheimer's, and possibly offer a treatment."

Aluminum, a common environmental metal, is found in higher-than-normal levels in the brains of humans with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease. An elevated level of aluminum in the brain is thought by some researchers to be a risk factor in the development of Alzheimer's, which about half of all people with Down syndrome develop in their 40s.

Croom and his colleagues report their findings this month (July) in the peer-reviewed journal Growth, Development and Aging. The paper's co-authors include researchers from Louisiana State University; the Medical University of South Carolina; the Great Smokies Diagnostic Laboratory in Asheville, N.C.; Duke University Medical Center; and from the departments of poultry science and animal science at NC State.

Peptide YY, called PYY for short, is a relatively small protein found in minuscule amounts in the body's gastrointestinal tract. Until recently, scientists believed its most important role was to help the body better digest and absorb fat. Croom has studied its effects on metabolism and nutrition on poultry and laboratory mice for nearly a decade.

PYY has been given safely to humans in clinical trials studying its effect on nutrition in people with Alzheimer's disease.

In Croom's most recent tests, conducted as blind trials at Great Smokies Diagnostic Laboratory, 80 mice were given either 300 micrograms of human recombinant PYY for every kilogram of body weight or 0.9 percent saline for three days. Half of the mice were normal; half had an extra copy of a portion of the 16th chromosome -- giving them similar metabolic defects as humans with Down syndrome, who have an extra copy of the 21st chromosome.

After the third day of the first trial, researchers found no significant change in aluminum levels in brain tissue of control mice, but an 80 percent drop in aluminum levels in brain tissue of both the normal and Down syndrome-model mice given PYY.

"The size and speed of the drop stunned us," Croom says. "It was totally unexpected."

FEAT Daily Newsletter August 3, 2000

FEAT (Families for Early Autism Treatment) is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing world class Education, Advocacy, and Support for the Northern California Autism Community