Parkinson's Disease News and Research

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Parkinson's disease is a brain disorder. It occurs when certain nerve cells (neurons) in a part of the brain called the substantia nigra die or become impaired. When approximately 80 percent of neurons are damaged, the symptoms of Parkinson's disease appear. Parkinson's disease affects 1 in 100 people over the age of 60, with the average age of onset being 60 years. The risk of developing Parkinson's disease increases with age. In the United States, it is estimated that 60,000 new cases of Parkinson's disease are diagnosed each year, with 1.5 million Americans currently living with the disease.

New Research Reveals Mitochondrial Guardians Linked to Parkinson’s and ALS

Scientists at Johns Hopkins Medicine say they have discovered how a group of proteins linked to Parkinson's disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis act as "guardians" of mitochondria, small organelles, or subunits, within a cell that make and store energy and are found in almost all plants and animals.

8 Apr 2025

Study Reveals How Syngap1 Gene Affects Touch-Based Perception in Mice

You may scarcely notice it, but much of what you do every day requires your brain to engage in perceptual learning.

14 Mar 2025

Rare ITSN1 Gene Variants Found to Significantly Elevate Parkinson's Risk

A new study published in Cell Reports reveals a breakthrough discovery linking genetic variants in the gene ITSN1 to a significantly elevated risk of Parkinson's disease, a neurodegenerative condition that affects nearly 2% of adults older than 65 years.

10 Mar 2025

Wayne State Researchers Receive $1.8 Million Grant for Mitophagy Study

A recent award from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences of the National Institutes of Health will aid Wayne State University researchers in their exploration of the underlying biology of several diseases.

22 Feb 2025

Blocking Cholesterol Metabolite May Prevent Parkinson's Disease Progression

Researchers led by Zhentao Zhang at Wuhan University, China have discovered a cholesterol metabolite that plays a critical role in the development of Parkinson's disease in mice.

19 Feb 2025

Researchers Apply Advanced AI Genetics Models to Study Parkinson's Disease

Researchers from the Cleveland Clinic Genome Center have successfully applied advanced artificial intelligence (AI) genetics models to Parkinson's disease. Researchers identified genetic factors in progression and FDA-approved drugs that can potentially be repurposed for PD treatment.

29 Jan 2025

Discovery Unlocks New Understanding of Autophagy in Health and Disease

A recent study from Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, India has revealed new details about how our cells clean up and recycle waste.

22 Jan 2025

UK Biobank to Study Protein Changes Across 600,000 Samples

UK Biobank has today announced the launch of the world's most comprehensive study of the proteins circulating in our bodies, which will transform the study of diseases and their treatments.

10 Jan 2025

New Discovery Sheds Light on How Monoamines Regulate Brain Rhythms

A collaborative effort between Mount Sinai and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center has shed valuable light on how monoamine neurotransmitters such as serotonin, dopamine, and now histamine help regulate brain physiology and behavior through chemical bonding of these monoamines to histone proteins, the core DNA-packaging proteins of our cells.

9 Jan 2025

Research Reveals Regulatory Role of Glucose-6-Phosphate Dehydrogenase in Mitophagy

Mitophagy is a selective form of autophagy via which the damaged mitochondria are cleared via the autophagy-lysosome pathway.

30 Dec 2024

New Gene Editing Tool Targets Alzheimer's by Skipping Disease-Causing Gene Segments

A new gene editing tool that helps cellular machinery skip parts of genes responsible for diseases has been applied to reduce the formation of amyloid-beta plaque precursors in a mouse model of Alzheimer's disease, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign report.

24 Dec 2024

Space Experiment Reveals Surprising Brain Cell Behavior

Microgravity exposure accelerates brain cell development in organoids, revealing potential implications for neurodegenerative disease research and space health.

18 Dec 2024

Groundbreaking Discovery Connects Immune Cells with Neural and Metabolic Control

Immune cells have a surprising and critical role in controlling movement and bridging neural activity with metabolic demands, concludes a groundbreaking study published in Nature by researchers at the University of Copenhagen and Imperial College London.

5 Dec 2024

The Immune System’s Role in Neurodegenerative Disease

Researchers have discovered a new connection between Parkinson’s disease development and the immune system.

2 Dec 2024

New Method for Understanding Brain Function and Dysfunction

An international group of researchers from FutureNeuro, the Research Ireland Centre for Translational Brain Science, and RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences have created a novel technique to characterize gene activity in the living human brain.

26 Nov 2024