What? Drinking alcohol can cause Alzheimer's disease?

Now there are more and more reasons to drink.

I'm in a good mood, I want to have a drink

When I'm in a bad mood, I drink to relieve my sorrow

From the sun exploding to ants moving

Can be a reason to have a meal

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In fact, many people have become dependent on alcohol.

I just haven't noticed yet.

Drink to your heart's content

But Dr. Huaxi reminded everyone

Excessive drinking has risks

May cause Alzheimer's disease!

Senile dementia, scientifically known as Alzheimer's disease. In recent years, people have paid more and more attention to Alzheimer's disease, and it can be said that it has reached the point where people are terrified by the mention of it.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease with an insidious onset and progressive development. Its clinical features are mainly cognitive impairment, mental and behavioral abnormalities, and decreased social function. —— "Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Mental Disorders (2020 Edition)"

Due to cognitive impairment, patients with Alzheimer's disease often have difficulty taking care of themselves.

Suddenly you can’t find the way home that you take every day, you suddenly don’t recognize your closest family members, and you forget what you did just a few minutes ago in the next second - these are all symptoms of Alzheimer's disease, which bring unspeakable pain to yourself and your family.

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Currently, it is generally recognized that the imbalance in the production and clearance of β-amyloid protein (amyloid-β, Aβ) is the initiating factor of neuronal degeneration and dementia.

Abnormal levels of amyloid-β form plaques between neurons in the brain that are neurotoxic and lead to neuronal degeneration.

In recent years , the brain inflammatory response hypothesis, intestinal microbial hypothesis, herpes virus hypothesis, Porphyromonas gingivalis hypothesis and so on have been proposed.

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Don’t understand? It doesn’t matter. In simple terms, there is too much toxic protein Aβ, which makes the brain unable to function.

It is still related to the Aβ protein mentioned above. Current research has found that alcohol has the following four main mechanisms of action on Alzheimer's disease:

Makes toxic proteins difficult to remove

Microglia are immune cells that can help us clear the toxic protein Aβ, but long-term drinking can inhibit the function of these cells , increasing the risk of Alzheimer's disease!

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Causes the toxic protein to grow wildly

To explain this clearly, we must first understand where Aβ protein comes from.

There is something called hippocampal APP in the brain, which produces Aβ toxic protein under the catalysis of the enzyme BACE-1.

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Then some scientists did an interesting experiment:

Scientists divided mice that looked similar into two groups, one that was fed alcohol every day and the other that was not. After five weeks of experiments, they found that the BACE-1 enzyme and hippocampal APP in the mice that drank alcohol every day increased.

In other words, the production of Aβ toxic protein in alcoholic mice increases, and the probability of developing Alzheimer's disease increases!

Causes normal protein to stop working

Tau protein is an important protein that allows our brain to respond normally. When we drink too much, Tau protein will become over-phosphorylated.

When Tau is overphosphorylated, the brain cannot function properly, which can also become a major cause of Alzheimer's disease.

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Liver damage can also increase the incidence of Alzheimer's disease

As we all know, drinking alcohol will definitely damage the liver. Once the liver is damaged, it will promote the release of cytokine TNT-α by cells in the liver. This cytokine TNT-α will also increase the probability of developing Alzheimer's disease!

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In addition to the above, further scientific research has also shown that long-term drinking can worsen metabolic regulation in the brain and peripheral tissues - another way to accelerate the progression of Alzheimer's disease.

In summary, regular and heavy drinking increases the risk of Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's disease is a currently incurable disease that will have a great impact on daily life and family happiness.

Drinking makes you feel good for a while, but for the long term, don’t drink too much!

Statement: This article is a medical-related educational popular science article. It does not involve specific treatment methods or medical behaviors and cannot replace hospital visits.

Author

Experts who reviewed this article

References

[1] Han P, Shi J. A Theoretical Analysis of the Synergy of Amyloid and Tau in Alzheimer's Disease. J Alzheimers Dis. 2016 Apr 19;52(4):1461-70.

[2] You Jiabin. Study on the changes of phosphorylation expression of Tau protein Ser396 and Thr205 sites induced by chronic ethanol exposure[D]. China Medical University, 2018.

[3] Chandrashekar DV, Steinberg RA, Han D, Sumbria RK. Alcohol as a Modifiable Risk Factor for Alzheimer's Disease-Evidence from Experimental Studies. Int J Mol Sci. 2023 May 30;24(11):9492.

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Editor: Zhang Fuyao

Map: Eastern Zhou Dynasty