When you get herpes type 1, tau, an Alzheimer’s disease factor, is triggered to protect your brain.
A new study found that herpes induces the expression of tau protein, one of the factors that cause Alzheimer’s disease. This is what the health and medicine webzine ‘Health Day’ reported on the 8th (local time) based on a paper by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh published in Cell Reports.
Herpes viruses are viruses containing DNA and are of type 1 (HSV1) and type 2 (HSV2). Type 1 mainly causes herpes (blisters) around the lips, and type 2 mainly causes herpes around the genitals, but type 1 can also cause infection around the genitals.
What researchers focused on was HSV1, which causes herpes simplex. Infection with this virus causes greater amounts of tau protein to be expressed in the brain. The explanation is that it can initially protect the brain from viruses, but later brain damage occurs due to tangles of this protein, which is associated with Alzheimer’s disease.
“Our study challenges the conventional view that tau is harmful by showing that tau may initially act as part of the brain’s immune defenses,” said study lead author Or Shemesh, professor of ophthalmology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. “These findings highlight the complex interplay between infection, immune response, and neurodegeneration, providing new perspectives and potential targets for therapeutic development,” he said.
According to Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, 50% to 80% of American adults suffer from type 1 herpes. By age 50, approximately 90% of adults have been exposed to the HSV1 virus.
For this study, the researchers identified HSV1-related proteins in samples collected from the brains of Alzheimer’s patients. Additionally, a greater amount of HSV1 protein was discovered in ‘tau tangles’, where tau protein, known as one of the characteristics of Alzheimer’s disease, accumulates.
The researchers created a miniature cell model of the human brain in a Petri dish to study the virus’s effect on brain cells. According to the model, HSV1 infection can affect levels of tau protein in the brain, which plays a role in protecting nerve cells from death due to infection.
However, the researchers note that it is not yet clear how the herpes virus affects the tau protein and why tau switches from protection to destruction in some brains. Researchers plan to test drugs that target the herpes virus or fine-tune the brain’s immune response to see if they can lower the risk of other degenerative brain diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and Lou Gehrig’s disease.
The paper can be found at the following link (
Source: kormedi.com
