Researchers at the Northwestern University have found that a commonly used blood pressure drug may slow down and even completely stop the progress of Parkinson's disease. the details of their study appear in the June 10 online edition of the journal Nature.
The drug is widely used in the treatment of blood pressure and stroke. Led by D. James Surmeier, the researchers found that isradipine had the ability to restore aging neurons that lose the ability to produce the neurotransmitter dopamine. In Parkinson's there is an acute shortage of dopamine, which is important for a person to judge his movements properly.
Surmeier and colleagues focused on the dopamine producing neurons in the brain. The scientists already know that dopamine neurons are identical to pacemakers in that thy work in a non-stop manner seven days a week and 24 hours a day.
Usually these pacemakers used sodium ions to produce electrical signals. However the researchers found that instead of sodium, the dopamine neurons used calcium ions, which are unreliable and go wild. That is why the constant stress caused the dopamine neurons to degenerate and led to Parkinson's disease.
But young dopamine neurons still relied on sodium. "The cells had put away their old childhood tools in the closet. The question was if we stopped them from behaving like adults would they go into the closet and get them out again"" Surmeier asked. "Sure enough, they did."
Researchers administered isradipine to laboratory mice and found that the drug prevented calcium from entering the dopamine neurons thereby preventing their degeneration. "This lowers the cells' stress level and makes them much more resistant to any other insult that's going to come along down the road. They start acting like they're youngsters again," Surmeier said.
However he added that more tests were needed to ascertain the validity and efficacy of the above study.
