Scientific American on Alzheimer’s Research

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A recent interview slash book promotion at Scientific American presents a view of Alzheimer's research:

LEHRER: What do you think are the biggest public misconceptions of Alzheimer's disease?
DORAISWAMY: The two biggest misconceptions are "It's just aging" and "It's untreatable, so we should just leave the person alone." Both of these misconceptions are remnants of an outdated view that hinders families from getting the best diagnosis and best care. They were also one of the main reasons I wanted to write this book.

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LEHRER: Will science ever find a cure for Alzheimer's?

DORAISWAMY: It’s an incredibly tough puzzle to crack but the pace of research is so great that new drug targets are being reported daily. I think a form of cure is more likely to come from delaying the onset rather than by growing new brain cells to repair lost tissue. Realistically speaking there are several fundamental questions we don’t fully understand and have yet to answer: What causes the disease? Why do plaques and tangles form? Why are the memory centers the first to be destroyed? On the positive side, there are several dozen drugs in clinical trials.

If you're middle aged now and keep yourself in good health, you probably don't have much to fear from Alzheimer's disease. The condition will be understood and cured before you get to the point at which it's a risk; that much seems a good bet given the level of funding and speed of progress in biotechnology these days.

Along the way to curing Alzheimer's a great deal of very important information on the biochemistry and workings of the brain will be uncovered. One byproduct of today's intense research into neurobiochemistry and the inner workings of brain cells - much of it funded in the name of curing Alzheimer's - will be to take another step up the ladder on the way towards brain emulation and the ability to repair an age-damaged brain in situ. We'll need those capabilities if we wish to live far longer healthy lives than are presently possible, since the brain is the only organ we couldn't just replace as a matter of last resort in future years of far more advanced regenerative medicine.