A recent study published in Stem Cell Reports on March 28 has shown that familial Alzheimer’s disease can be transferred via bone marrow transplant. Researchers at the University of British Columbia transplanted bone marrow stem cells from mice with a hereditary form of Alzheimer’s disease into normal mice and found that the recipients developed Alzheimer’s disease at an accelerated rate. This study challenges the traditional view of Alzheimer’s as a disease that originates exclusively in the brain and suggests that amyloid originating outside of the brain may also play a role in its development.
The researchers found that the presence of amyloid plaques outside of the brain could contribute to the development of Alzheimer’s in the brain. They transplanted bone marrow containing stem cells from mice carrying a familial form of the disease into two different strains of recipient mice. Surprisingly, the transplant recipients began showing symptoms of cognitive decline much earlier than usual, with cognitive decline appearing as early as 6 months post-transplant for some mice. This suggests that the disease can be transferred from donor cells to healthy individuals.
The study also demonstrated that the mutated gene in the donor cells could cause the disease in recipient animals, regardless of whether the recipient carried a normal gene or lacked the gene altogether. This finding suggests that Alzheimer’s disease can result from amyloid produced outside of the central nervous system. Furthermore, the researchers used a human APP gene in the mice, demonstrating that the mutated human gene can transfer the disease to a different species.
In future studies, the researchers plan to explore whether transplanting tissues from normal mice to mice with familial Alzheimer’s could mitigate the disease. They also want to investigate whether the disease can be transferred via other types of transplants or transfusions and expand their investigation of disease transfer between species. It will be important to examine if disease transmission can occur through other forms of cellular therapies and to directly study the transfer of disease from contaminated sources.
This research was supported by various organizations including the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the W. Garfield Weston Foundation/Weston Brain Institute, the Centre for Blood Research, the University of British Columbia, the Austrian Academy of Science, and the Sullivan Urology Foundation at Vancouver General Hospital. The findings from this study shed light on the potential risks of transferring Alzheimer’s disease through bone marrow transplants and highlight the importance of screening donors for the disease to prevent inadvertent transmission during blood product transfusions and cellular therapies.
