According to a recent study, one of the first warning signs of an Alzheimer’s disease could be a reduced or missing sense of smell which could be early enough before memory problems start to happen.
The results, which were published in Nature Communications, point out to the fact that even slight alterations in sensory activity might be regarded as the initial brain alterations, associated with the ailment.
Scholars underline that the loss of ability of smell could become an early sign of Alzheimer’s even before the more common symptoms of the condition, including deterioration in memory, confusion, and cognitive abilities, crop up.
Scientists at the German research institute, DZNE, and the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich (LMU) were the researchers of the study.
Their writings emphasise the importance of the immune system in the brain in the initial stages of the development of Alzheimer.
Specifically, they discovered that microglia, which are specialised immune cells within the brain can initiate an attack against nerve cells that play a crucial role in processing smell.
It seems that this immune reaction disrupts the communication of two important parts of the brain.
The first one is the olfactory bulb, which perceives and interprets the smell signals via the nose.
The second brainstem segment that regulates this process and provides supportive nerve links is the locus ceruleus.
The processing and detection of smells can be impaired when these areas are not communicating.
The olfactory bulb is the forebrain region that plays a crucial role in odour recognition with the locus ceruleus involved in sustaining the operation of these sensory pathways by long-range neural networks.
The researchers believe that one of the primary biological changes that could occur with regard to Alzheimer’s disease is a premature destruction or even disruption of this network.
The research is founded on evidence collected on mouse models and on human brain tissue.
