With tau's aid, β-amyloid spurs the cells' microtubule network (white) to crumble (bottom).

King et al. reveal on page 541 how tau and β-amyloid might collaborate to spark the cellular devastation of Alzheimer's disease (AD). The findings suggest that the two rogue proteins team up to break down the microtubules that enable neurons to deliver necessities to their axons.

AD's hallmarks are β-amyloid plaques that pile up outside of neurons and tangles of tau that amass inside. How the two proteins interact remains mysterious, but previous work indicates that β-amyloid lies upstream of tau in the cell damage pathway.

To clarify the connection, King et al. engineered kidney cells to pump out tau. In neurons from AD patients, microtubules collapse. The researchers saw the same effect when they dosed their engineered kidney cells with Aβ42, a particularly destructive version of β-amyloid.

Individual β-amyloid molecules can...

The Rockefeller University Press
2006
The Rockefeller University Press
2006
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