Metabolism Models may Explain Why Alzheimer’s Disease Kills Some Neuron Types First (IMAGE)
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Bioengineers from the University of California, San Diego developed an explanation for why some types of neurons die sooner than others in the brains of people with Alzheimer’s disease. These insights, published in the journal Nature Biotechnology on Nov. 21, come from detailed models of brain energy metabolism developed in the Department of Bioengineering at the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering. The Alzheimer’s insights demonstrate how fundamental insights on human metabolism can be gleaned from computer models that incorporate large genomic and proteomic data sets with information from biochemical studies. UC San Diego bioengineering professor Bernhard Palsson and his students and collaborators first developed this “in silico” modeling approach for E. coli and other prokaryotes, and later extended it to human tissues.
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UC San Diego / Nathan Lewis
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UC San Diego / Nathan Lewis
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