4 ms·

There is no conventional treatment for prion disease, but methylene blue (Methylthioninium chloride), which has been around for over 100 years, has been investi

There is no conventional treatment for prion disease, but methylene blue (Methylthioninium chloride), which has been around for over 100 years, has been investigated as a preventive treatment with some success in mouse models: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23022479 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23022479 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25958115 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25958115 The problem is is that it's not patentable and it's super cheap. Thus, various drug companies like TauRX are tweaking it a little so it's patentable and are currently trying to get it through clinical trials. http://taurx.com/science http://taurx.com/science

DiabloD3 11y ago
What's really interesting is the nootropic crowd has been experimenting with methylene blue for years; a lot of stacks published by nootropic enthusiasts have featured it to increase ATP production (same reason why I take methylcobalamin for my B12). I personally suspect a lot of "modern" neurodegeneration diseases (such as Alzheimer's) are directly linked to malfunction and eventual death of mitochondria through years of abuse by poor dietary standards, especially in the US, as in, not enough of the B vitamins (which participates in the production of ATP, CoA, acetyl-CoA, NAD, NADP, etc), including Choline and PABA (not usually considered B Vitamins, but have, at one point, been assigned B numbers).
- narrator 11y ago
  Methylene blue improves Complex IV function in mitochondria, so it certainly has a direct effect on mitochondrial function. It's actually used as an antidote to several poisons that inhibit mitochondrial function[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methylene_blue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methylene_blue
- carbocation 11y ago
  Methylene blue is available in hospitals, often as a vasopressor of last resort ("four pressor shock").
- caycep 11y ago
  maybe, but the BS detector of a lot of people in the field are ticked off when someone tries to propose one cause for a broad variety of biologically different disease. It's also hard to prove that it isn't a general effect, vs the cause, of badness. mitochondrially-powered eukaryotic cells are awfully more susceptible to many things and my cynicism suspects you can measure worn/beaten up mitochondria in pretty much anyone as they age. The last CoQ10 trial that was based on the mitochondrial stuff for Parkinson's failed miserably. If someone can design an experiment to prove a causative role of mitochondria in all of this, more power to them, but a lot of the proposed mechanisms never really appealed to me as all that compelling, other than to note correlation, i.e. "All of our Disease X patients exhibits abnormal test Y, which could potentially, possibly, but not definitely, be related to mitochondrial dysfunction, and this is why the NIH should give our group more grant money next year!"
  - DiabloD3 11y ago
    I don't understand the point of supplementing CoQ10 alone. CoQ10 is one of about twenty or thirty things that should be supplemented if, indeed, this is the correct route to improving life.
    - caycep 11y ago
      IMHO, it was the easy way out. You do a trial with one substance at a time, and do a simple randomized controlled trial; which is how most of medical research works. More than one agent and you have to hire more statisticians to do your experimental design, and it is harder to get somewhat simpleminded grant committees to understand your proposal.

DiabloD3 11y ago

What's really interesting is the nootropic crowd has been experimenting with methylene blue for years; a lot of stacks published by nootropic enthusiasts have featured it to increase ATP production (same reason why I take methylcobalamin for my B12). I personally suspect a lot of "modern" neurodegeneration diseases (such as Alzheimer's) are directly linked to malfunction and eventual death of mitochondria through years of abuse by poor dietary standards, especially in the US, as in, not enough of the B vitamins (which participates in the production of ATP, CoA, acetyl-CoA, NAD, NADP, etc), including Choline and PABA (not usually considered B Vitamins, but have, at one point, been assigned B numbers).

narrator 11y ago
Methylene blue improves Complex IV function in mitochondria, so it certainly has a direct effect on mitochondrial function. It's actually used as an antidote to several poisons that inhibit mitochondrial function[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methylene_blue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methylene_blue
carbocation 11y ago
Methylene blue is available in hospitals, often as a vasopressor of last resort ("four pressor shock").
caycep 11y ago
maybe, but the BS detector of a lot of people in the field are ticked off when someone tries to propose one cause for a broad variety of biologically different disease. It's also hard to prove that it isn't a general effect, vs the cause, of badness. mitochondrially-powered eukaryotic cells are awfully more susceptible to many things and my cynicism suspects you can measure worn/beaten up mitochondria in pretty much anyone as they age. The last CoQ10 trial that was based on the mitochondrial stuff for Parkinson's failed miserably. If someone can design an experiment to prove a causative role of mitochondria in all of this, more power to them, but a lot of the proposed mechanisms never really appealed to me as all that compelling, other than to note correlation, i.e. "All of our Disease X patients exhibits abnormal test Y, which could potentially, possibly, but not definitely, be related to mitochondrial dysfunction, and this is why the NIH should give our group more grant money next year!"
- DiabloD3 11y ago
  I don't understand the point of supplementing CoQ10 alone. CoQ10 is one of about twenty or thirty things that should be supplemented if, indeed, this is the correct route to improving life.
  - caycep 11y ago
    IMHO, it was the easy way out. You do a trial with one substance at a time, and do a simple randomized controlled trial; which is how most of medical research works. More than one agent and you have to hire more statisticians to do your experimental design, and it is harder to get somewhat simpleminded grant committees to understand your proposal.