4 new genes identified for Alzheimer's disease risk

“Mount Sinai has unique resources that we contributed to the study, having one of the largest brain banks for Alzheimer samples in the world,” said lead Mount Sinai scientist, Joseph Buxbaum, PhD, Professor of Psychiatry, Neuroscience, and Genetics and Genomic Sciences at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. “Follow up studies of the genes identified, to determine how they affect brain biochemistry, are now possible in our samples, and this can help us understand how the genes contribute to Alzheimer's disease”

The study, conducted by the Alzheimer's Disease Genetics Consortium, consisting of investigators from 44 universities and research institutions in the United States, and led by Gerard D. Schellenberg, PhD, at Penn, with primary analysis sites at Miami, led by Margaret A. Pericak-Vance, PhD, and Boston, led by Lindsay A. Farrer, PhD, analyzed more than 11,000 people with Alzheimer's disease and nearly the same number of elderly people who have no symptoms of dementia. Three additional institutions contributed confirming data, bringing the total number of people analyzed in the study to over 54,000.

The researchers had two main goals for the study. First was the identification of new Alzheimer's disease genes to provide major clues as to its underlying cause. Genetic studies can provide new insights into the molecules at the center of the disease. Obtaining this type of understanding is critical for drug discovery, since the treatments currently available to patients are only slightly effective.

The second goal was for the gene discovery of the type highlighted in the Nature Genetics article to ultimately contribute to predicting who will develop Alzheimer's disease, which will be important when preventive measures become available. Knowing these risk genes will also help identify the first disease-initiating steps that begin in the brain long before any symptoms of memory loss or intellectual decline are apparent. This knowledge will help researchers understand the events that lead to the destruction of large parts of the brain and eventually the complete loss of cognitive abilities.

The research published in Nature Genetics was supported by the National Institute on Aging, (part of the National Institutes of Health, which includes 29 Alzheimer's Disease Centers), the National Alzheimer's Coordinating Center, the NIA Genetics of Alzheimer's Disease Data Storage Site, the NIA Late Onset Alzheimer's Disease Family Study, and the National Cell Repository for Alzheimer's Disease. These centers collect, store, and make available to qualified researchers DNA samples, datasets containing biomedical and demographic information about participants, and genetic analysis data.

Mount Sinai ranks third in funding by the National Institute of Aging of the National Institutes of Health, including an Alzheimer's Disease Center.

About The Mount Sinai Medical Center

The Mount Sinai Medical Center encompasses both The Mount Sinai Hospital and Mount Sinai School of Medicine. Established in 1968, Mount Sinai School of Medicine is one of few medical schools embedded in a hospital in the United States. It has more than 3,400 faculty in 32 departments and 15 institutes, and ranks among the top 20 medical schools both in National Institute of Health funding and by U.S. News & World Report. The school received the 2009 Spencer Foreman Award for Outstanding Community Service from the Association of American Medical Colleges.

The Mount Sinai Hospital, founded in 1852, is a 1,171-bed tertiary- and quaternary-care teaching facility and one of the nation's oldest, largest and most-respected voluntary hospitals. U.S. News & World Report consistently ranks The Mount Sinai Hospital among the nation's best hospitals based on reputation, patient safety, and other patient-care factors. Nearly 60,000 people were treated at Mount Sinai as inpatients last year, and approximately 530,000 outpatient visits took place.