Mark A. Smith, who went to CIMA at the University of Navarra, doubts that the increase in two proteins determines mental deterioration. 

Today it is accepted as dogma that the increase in the training of two proteins, beta-amyloid and phosphorylated tau, is determinant for the lesion of certain neuronal groups in the brain and the consequent loss of mental capacity that characterizes Alzheimer's disease.

Dr. Mark A. Smith, from the high school of Pathology at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland (USA), questions this scientific belief and expressed it in the research center Applied Medicine (CIMA) of the University of Navarra. Professor Smith gave a lecture at lecture at the area of Neurosciences at CIMA entitled "Pathogenesis of Alzheimer's Disease: Facts and Fictions".

Greater predisposition of women

According to this British expert, the accumulation of these proteins follows oxidative stress, a set of degenerative molecular processes associated with aging that produce toxic molecules. In addition, beta-amyloid can even protect against oxidative damage, which is necessary but not sufficient for the injury of groups of nerve cells.

He also explained that there is another factor that can determine the progression of Alzheimer's disease and the greater predisposition of women: the concentration of gonadotropic hormones (precursors of female sex hormones), whose receptors are more abundant in the brain regions that degenerate the most in the course of the disease. In this regard, Mark A. Smith showed caution and hope in the first clinical trials on Alzheimer's patients treated with leuprolide, a drug that reduces the concentration of gonadotropins.