Research may help Down syndrome
patients increase learning capacity
Researchers at the University of Colorado Denver (UCD) may have found a way to reverse the learning deficit associated with Down syndrome, potentially leading to a new therapy that would increase the learning capacity of people with the genetic disorder.
The findings from the study were published in the Aug. 15 advance online edition of Neuropsychopharmacology, a publication of the Nature Publishing Group. In the report the authors state that this “is the first instance in which acute injection of a drug agent has improved the behavioral performance of Down syndrome mice in a test of learning and memory,” and that the findings are promising from a therapeutical perspective.
The research study tested the effectiveness of memantine, an FDA-approved drug that is used to treat patients with Alzheimer’s disease, on mice with an animal model of Down syndrome.
The mice with Down syndrome and healthy control mice were placed in a chamber where they experienced a mild, harmless, electric shock. While the control mice were able to associate being in the chamber with the unpleasant shock and would experience freezing behavior when placed in the chamber 24 hours later, the Down syndrome mice were not able to recall the stimulus at all.
Researchers found that when the Down syndrome mice were given two doses of memantine they displayed the same freezing behaviors as the control mice. The first dose was given 15 minutes before the mice were exposed to the stimulus; the second was given 24 hours later before their second exposure to the chamber.
The research showed that the first dose of memantine was the most important, indicating the importance of the drug’s role in memory formation, rather than memory retrieval.
Alberto Costa, MD, PhD, associate professor of medicine and neuroscience at UCD’s School of Medicine and lead author of the study, hopes that the studies will lead to further research and potential therapy for the cognitive defects associated with Down syndrome.
“ After 11 years working in the field of Down syndrome, I feel fortunate to finally be in a position of being able to use scientific research to try to help improve the quality of the life of people who share the same genetic disorder as my daughter,” Costa said.
