Kumar DK, Choi SH, Washicosky KJ, Eimer WA, Tucker S, Ghofrani J, Lefkowitz A, McColl G, Goldstein LE, Tanzi RE, Moir RD. Amyloid-β peptide protects against microbial infection in mouse and worm models of Alzheimer's disease. Sci Transl Med. 2016 May 25;8(340):340ra72. PubMed.

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  1. As a further comment to this article I want to be perfectly clear that this study helps support the work that many of us in the infection arena of Alzheimer’s research have been looking at for almost three decades. I cannot even begin to address the enormity of this work by so many investigators around the globe, although if one searches in PubMed, most of these articles are readily obtainable. However, there are a few points that I would like to address. Specifically, with regard to looking in human AD brain tissues which is now proposed as a follow-up study to the current Kumar et al. report, we reported on finding Chlamydia pneumoniae in AD brains in 1998, Ruth Itzhaki reported on HSV1 in human brains in 1991, and Judith Miklossy reported on Borrelia species in AD brains in 1993. These are just three reports on infectious agents in human AD brains out of many, many more in the literature. Furthermore, from my lab we have demonstrated that Chlamydia pneumoniae, a respiratory intracellular organism, inoculated through a normal route (i.e., intranasally) into normal non-transgenic mice actually resulted in amyloid plaques in the brain (Little et al., 2004, 2014). These studies already demonstrated that amyloid could be a consequence of infection entering the CNS and we believe this will result in pathological accumulations, especially in human brains. Itzhaki and Miklossy and others have demonstrated a relationship between infection and amyloid as well. These comments are not to detract from the current report, but they are needed to provide an appropriate context in which to evaluate the current findings.

    References:

    Jamieson GA, Maitland NJ, Wilcock GK, Craske J, Itzhaki RF. Latent herpes simplex virus type 1 in normal and Alzheimer's disease brains. J Med Virol. 1991 Apr;33(4):224-7. PubMed.

    Miklossy J. Alzheimer's disease--a spirochetosis?. Neuroreport. 1993 Jul;4(7):841-8. PubMed.

    Balin BJ, Gérard HC, Arking EJ, Appelt DM, Branigan PJ, Abrams JT, Whittum-Hudson JA, Hudson AP. Identification and localization of Chlamydia pneumoniae in the Alzheimer's brain. Med Microbiol Immunol. 1998 Jun;187(1):23-42. PubMed.

    Little CS, Joyce TA, Hammond CJ, Matta H, Cahn D, Appelt DM, Balin BJ. Detection of bacterial antigens and Alzheimer's disease-like pathology in the central nervous system of BALB/c mice following intranasal infection with a laboratory isolate of Chlamydia pneumoniae. Front Aging Neurosci. 2014;6:304. Epub 2014 Dec 5 PubMed.

    Little CS, Hammond CJ, MacIntyre A, Balin BJ, Appelt DM. Chlamydia pneumoniae induces Alzheimer-like amyloid plaques in brains of BALB/c mice. Neurobiol Aging. 2004 Apr;25(4):419-29. PubMed.

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