• Question: Is it true that sperm can cure alzheimers

    Asked by Sheldon Cooper to Eleni, Hannah, Jenny, Oli, Steven on 15 Nov 2016.
    • Photo: Oliver Charity

      Oliver Charity answered on 15 Nov 2016:

      Hi Sheldon,

      I havent heard of this, I dont think so. Alzheimers is predicted to be caused by a malformed, infectious protein, which goes around the body finding proteins which look similar to it, but are slightly different, and changing the shape of these proteins to look like it does, in its malformed shape. I can’t see how sperm would cure this, but you never know.

      Oli

    • Photo: Jenny Batson

      Jenny Batson answered on 15 Nov 2016:

      Hi Sheldon
      I don’t think so. Currently there is no cure for Alzheimers but scientists understand the disease better from research over the last 30 years. At the moment drugs work to treat the symptoms of Alzheimers but future hopes aim to reduce the disease process more directly, e.g. by targeting amyloid plaques, see this website
      http://www.alz.org/research/science/alzheimers_treatment_horizon.asp#targets
      Jenny

    • Photo: Steven Street

      Steven Street answered on 15 Nov 2016:

      Hi Sheldon,

      So you’ve just made me google ‘does sperm cure alzheimers’… 😛 What I can find is a link that talks about a compound present in sperm – spermidine, which apparently helps prolong the life of cells. This link to ageing is what people have said ‘could be useful’ for age related diseases such as alzheimers… But I think they are clutching at straws a bit there!!

      For more information on spermidine (and it’s suprisingly simple structure, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spermidine )

      Steve

    • Photo: Hannah Bolt

      Hannah Bolt answered on 15 Nov 2016:

      Hi Sheldon,

      I also googled your question like Steve and came to the same answer as him!

      Spermidine (a chemical that is also found in sperm) has been shown to increase the life of cells, like human immune cells or in mice, words and fungus.

      The scientists showed that in mice treated with spermidine, cell damage linked to aging was reduced and the spermidine helped cells to get rid of damaged proteins.

      Alzheimer’s is thought to be caused by damaged proteins (or ‘misfolded’ proteins that aren’t in the right shape) so I think this is where the link to Alzheimer’s comes in. However, this is only one study and at a very early stage, so any potential cure for Alzheimer’s using spermidine is a very long way off!

      Hannah

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