Innovation Anthology #229:
Not all prion proteins are bad. The good ones are called PrPc, and they are present throughout the central nervous system.
However, when prion proteins misfold, they lead to disease. In the case of humans, this is Creutzfeld-Jakob disease.
Anna Carnini from the University of Calgary is trying to understand what goes wrong by studying people with spinal cord injuries.
Her poster at the recent Prion Conference in Edmonton outlines the differences she found in their cerebral spinal fluid when compared to healthy people.
ANNA CARNINI: We looked at the levels of this protein in the CSF in patients that had spinal cord injury. And what we observed is that compared to a patient that was in a healthy condition, the level of PrPc after spinal cord injury decreased. We do not know what that implies at this stage. But we are observing that somehow there is not as much good PrPc being excreted in the CSF.
Anna Carnini hopes this research will lead to a better understanding of the role good prions play in protecting human health.
Thanks today to The Canadian Institutes for Health Research
FOR INNOVATION ANTHOLOGY I’M CHERYL CROUCHER
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Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Program Date: 2009-05-28