Viral diseases promote the spread of neurodegenerative diseases
October 2021
Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn, Bonn, Germany
Neurodegenerative diseases are characterized at the cellular level by misfolding proteins that form aggregated complexes and progressively infect the surrounding cell tissue. The transport mechanism of protein complexes into neighbouring cells is still unexplored. The research group of the present study suspects that the propagation of the aggregates takes place via direct cell contact or receptor-ligand-mediated transport in extracellular vesicles (EV). Therefore the effect of various viral glycoproteins in several cell models was investigated. In the cell cultures, which were additionally infected with viral enzymes, there was an accelerated invasion of the protein aggregates into the healthy neighbouring cells. The results of the study support the hypothesis that viral diseases have a significant influence on the development of neurodegenerative diseases. The study thus provides new findings of high relevance for further research into incurable diseases such as Alzheimer's or Parkinson's.
Highly efficient intercellular spreading of protein misfolding mediated by viral ligand-receptor interactions
Ina M. Vorberg
Added on: 08-08-2022
[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-25855-2[2] https://www.bionity.com/en/news/1173242/viral-infections-could-drive-neurodegeneration.html
