Bio Briefs

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Flinn Foundation

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Apr 14, 2010
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Brain-Imaging study supports the relevance of a common genetic risk factor

Tags: alzheimers disease, arizona state university, banner alzheimer's institute, mayo clinic arizona, neuroscience, tgen, university of arizona

[Source: PR Newswire] - A brain-imaging study published today in the Archives of Neurology suggests that a major genetic risk factor for Alzheimer's disease in the Anglo population is also a risk factor for the disease in Latinos.

While a gene called APOE4 has been firmly established to increase an Anglo person's risk of Alzheimer's disease, its relationship to the disease in different Latino populations has been less clear. In previous studies, researchers from the Banner Alzheimer's Institute and their collaborators in the Arizona Alzheimer's Consortium used a brain-imaging technique called PET to show that cognitively healthy late-middle-aged carriers of the APOE4 gene have lower activity than non-carriers of the gene in brain regions known to be affected by Alzheimer's disease.

For more information: Brain-Imaging Study Supports the Relevance of a Common Genetic Risk Factor for Alzheimer's Disease in Latinos