Scientists are working on early diagnosis of Alzheimer's with blood tests
ETU Molecular Biology and Genetics Department Associate Professor Dr. Mehmet Enes Arslan, Mathematics Department Associate Professor Dr. Harun Selvitopi and Basic Sciences Department Associate Professor Dr. Murat Aydemir applied to TÜBİTAK with their project "Development of Aggregation-Induced Fluorescence (AIE) probes for early diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease".
The team, whose applications were approved and who started experimental studies with support, aims to diagnose Alzheimer's disease early through blood tests.
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Arslan said that they have been working on drugs that can be effective in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases and that can cure the disease for years.
Arslan, who stated that there is no cure for the disease in the world, said, "The drugs used only try to slow down the progression of the disease and provide the patient with a more comfortable life at that moment, but they do not cure the disease. The disease starts, patients show certain symptoms, they make diagnoses, but the patient cannot go back, its progression cannot be stopped or reversed. It is only slowed down, but the disease cannot be treated. The biggest reason for this is that when the disease is diagnosed, it is too late. The biggest problem for this disease is not being diagnosed early."
Arslan explained that they started from this point and aimed to find a method that would allow them to diagnose the disease before symptoms appeared and before the disease progressed in the brain.
Arslan, who stated that they determined molecules and designed certain molecules, noted the following: "As a result of the synthesis and characterization of these molecules, we started to look at whether we could detect very low amounts of proteins in the region where the protein is located, in the blood or by taking the protein itself and isolating them. We have currently established a company based on our work. We are trying to perform analyses to determine whether or not this person has the beginning of Alzheimer's disease in a sample we take from the blood with the help of a kit. Our goal in the project was to be able to detect Alzheimer's disease with the samples we take from the blood. If we can detect whether or not there is a very small amount of the protein that causes that toxic disease in this blood environment by taking a drop of blood from a person without taking an image of the brain, we can make early diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease possible and treatment may also be possible."
Arslan said that they are currently in the preliminary phase of the study and that they have successfully completed this phase, and that they have the protein that causes this disease, and that they have started to detect the proteins with very low amounts of probes.
Arslan, stating that there are several different methods to diagnose Alzheimer's disease but that they do not provide definitive results, said, "Thanks to this test, if we say that someone has an onset of the disease, we will be able to say that 99.9 percent of the time they are sick. That's the good side of this, that is, it is a method that can tell for sure whether someone is sick or not, in theory. At the same time, when we look at it originally, it is easy to produce."
"EXPERIMENTAL STUDIES HAVE STARTED"Department of Mathematics Faculty Member Assoc. Prof. Dr. Harun Selvitopi explained that they first identified molecules that could bind to the existing Alzheimer's protein with their calculations, and said, "After identifying molecules that bind with high energy, the synthesis phase was started and they were developed. We started working on it, experimental studies have started and we are in the first phase."
Department of Basic Sciences Faculty Member Assoc. Prof. Dr. Murat Aydemir also pointed out that the kit they are trying to develop is designed for the purpose of pre-diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease, and said, "One of the goals we are trying to achieve is to have the organic molecule interact with the protein correctly. Our starting point here is actually based on a very strong theory, but sometimes the application stages may not coincide with the studies 100 percent. We are trying to continue our experimental studies with different molecule designs, different application methods, and different optimizations in order to increase those stages to 100 percent."
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