Alzheimer's disease is one of the most dreaded diseases of them all. As the brain disease progresses, a person will lose his or her memories and other cognitive abilities. Alzheimer's disease patients who are in the advanced stage of the disease forget how to perform basic skills such as putting on their clothes and eating food. They even forget their loved ones.
Experts believe that these memories have been destroyed forever. But what if these memories are not gone but only inaccessible? MIT scientists did a research on the matter which produced some evidence that it might be possible in the future to recover these lost and forgotten memories, The Washington Post reports.
"The important point is, this is a proof of concept," Susumu Tonegawa at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology told The Washington Post. "That is, even if a memory seems to be gone, it is still there. It's a matter of how to retrieve it."
The research involved animal experiments on two groups of mice. One group had normal brain functions while the other group was genetically modified to display symptoms of memory loss.
Both groups were then given a gentle electric shock. The first group appeared to be traumatized while the second group seemed to have already forgotten what just happened.
"Their reaction changed dramatically when the scientists stimulated tagged cells in their brains in the hippocampus - the part of the brain that encodes short-term memories - with a special blue light," The Washington Post explains. The second group of mice appeared to share the same fear as the first group of mice after being exposed with the special light.
Although the development of Alzheimer's disease can be hereditary, the risk of developing this degenerative brain disease can be reduced by making some lifestyle changes. Exercising regularly, eating healthy food, exercising the brain, getting an adequate amount of sleep every day, proper management of anxiety and stress and having a positive social life can help prevent Alzheimer's disease, according to Help Guide.
