Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathy - Possible Cure or Vaccine and Diagnosis

Possible Cure or Vaccine and Diagnosis

There continues to be a very practical problem with diagnosis of prion diseases, including BSE and CJD. They have an incubation period of months to decades during which there are no symptoms, even though the pathway of converting the normal brain PrP protein into the toxic, disease-related PrP Sc form has started. At present, there is virtually no way to detect PrPSc reliably except by examining the brain using neuropathological and immunohistochemical methods after death. Accumulation of the abnormally folded PrPSc form of the PrP protein is a characteristic of the disease, but it is present at very low levels in easily accessible body fluids like blood or urine. Researchers have tried to develop methods to measure PrPSc, but there are still no fully accepted methods for use in materials such as blood.

In 2010, A team from New York described detection of PrPSc even when initially present at only one part in a hundred thousand million (10−11) in brain tissue. The method combines amplification with a novel technology called Surround Optical Fiber Immunoassay (SOFIA) and some specific antibodies against PrPSc. After amplifying and then concentrating any PrPSc, the samples are labelled with a fluorescent dye using an antibody for specificity and then finally loaded into a micro-capillary tube. This tube is placed in a specially constructed apparatus so that it is totally surrounded by optical fibres to capture all light emitted once the dye is excited using a laser. The technique allowed detection of PrPSc after many fewer cycles of conversion than others have achieved, substantially reducing the possibility of artefacts, as well as speeding up the assay. The researchers also tested their method on blood samples from apparently healthy sheep that went on to develop scrapie. The animals’ brains were analysed once any symptoms became apparent. The researchers could therefore compare results from brain tissue and blood taken once the animals exhibited symptoms of the diseases, with blood obtained earlier in the animals’ lives, and from uninfected animals. The results showed very clearly that PrPSc could be detected in the blood of animals long before the symptoms appeared.

Recent research from the University of Toronto and Caprion Pharmaceuticals has discovered one possible avenue which might lead to quicker diagnosis, a vaccine or possibly even treatment for prion diseases. The abnormally folded proteins which cause the disease have been found to expose a side chain of amino acids which the properly folded protein does not expose. Antibodies specifically coded to this side chain amino acid sequence have been found to stimulate an immune response to the abnormal prions and leave the normal proteins intact.

Another idea involves using custom peptide sequences. Since some research suggests prions aggregate by forming beta barrel structures, work done in vitro has shown that peptides made up of beta barrel-incompatible amino acids can help break up accumulations of prion. Yet a third idea concerns genetic therapy, whereby the gene for encoding protease-resistant protein is considered to be an error in several species, and therefore something to be inhibited.