Student discovers that rhubarb extract may prevent Alzheimer’s disease

Motivated by working in seniors’ homes, 17-year-old Linda Liu discovered that an extract from rhubarb prevented the misfolding of a protein that is associated with disease. The extract also dissolved previously misfolded proteins offering the glimmer of hope of both potential prevention and treatment for the disease.

The tragedy of Alzheimer’s is well documented. Every 70 seconds someone develops the disease in North America. Today there are five to six million Alzheimer victims in Canada and the US.

“Having volunteered in seniors’ homes I was inspired by the devastating effects of Alzheimer’s disease,” said Linda, whose goal is to become an MD.

The high school student researched the disease and learned that this common form of dementia can be caused by the misfolding of tau proteins commonly found in the central nervous system. She also learned that traditional medicine in India considers rhubarb as an important plant and may possess the ability to treat Alzheimer’s disease. It also contains antioxidants known to prevent Alzheimer’s.

To test whether rhubarb could be effective Linda used different amounts of extract on tau proteins and added a chemical known as Heparin which causes tau to misfold. There were also control samples that contained the materials listed above but without extract. The extract was able to cut the amount of misfolding by 50% and dissolved 50% of misfolded tau.

What’s even more exciting is that misfolding of tau proteins is associated with many other diseases including Parkinson’s disease, arthritis, diabetes, mad cow disease, atherosclerosis, ALS (Lou Gherig’s disease), and Huntington’s disease.

Linda’s project demonstrates that it may be able to prevent and treat Alzheimer’s as well as other diseases that involve the same basic mechanisms, said her mentor Scott Yuzwa, a researcher at the Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, BC.

“I was most impressed by Linda’s ability to read and understand primary scientific literature. She was able to propose a project on her own that required extensive literature research followed by careful experimental planning,” Dr Yuzwa said.