Subscribe: iTunes Stitcher. Lisa Genova: Thank you so much. Kathy Smith: Let me ask you. Can you tell us a little bit more about what is the purpose and the focus of the prize? Those folks tend to be biologists, neuroscientists, people who have been trained very specific way to think about the problems of the brain, and they tend to work alone, and they tend to work on one project at a time. Anyone who wants to jump in can. Lisa Genova: Absolutely. So, this just brings more people to the table.
We have 50 million people worldwide who have this now. Baby boomers are getting older. Age is the number one risk factor for this disease. I love thinking aboutβyou talk about fitness a lot. We can prevent, we can go to the doctor, we can exercise, eat Mediterranean diet, on and on.
So, some of the solutions in heart health has come from people who never studied the heart is my point. Anyone who might be able to think about this is now invited to the table. Kathy Smith: It gives more and more people the opportunity to give their input. The disease pathology, we think, begins as an increase in a protein called amyloid beta. It starts to accumulate in the synapses, which are the spaces between two neurons where they communicate. There are lots of hypotheses floating around out there and lots of active research as to why amyloid starts to increase.
But around the age of 40, we think it starts to increase and accumulate. Over time, as it reaches the tipping point, then you start to notice some memory glitches. Why did I come in this room? We live in such a distracted world today. After the tipping point, the memory glitches are different. You have some associations and some language clues that sort of are trying to help you get to that word. The associations drop out.
Kathy Smith: I know that you mentioned neurons and, then, you mentioned the synapses β the space between the neurons.
