Animal Studies Indicate Aging Brain Responsive T...( WASHINGTON -- Duke researchers have f...)

WASHINGTON -- Duke researchers have found that aging female rats treated with estrogen show more connections in a brain area associated with memory formation than did similar untreated rats. The scientists believe their finding offers evidence that minor memory losses sometimes associated with aging might be alleviated by replacing estrogens.

The authors of the study, Phillippa Henderson, Christina Williams and Gillian Einstein, prepared their findings for presentation Friday (Nov. 15) at the Society for Neuroscience meeting.

Henderson is a medical student at the Duke University Medical Center; Williams is an associate professor in the department of psychology -- experimental, and Einstein is an assistant research professor in the medical center's department of neurobiology. Their research was sponsored by the American Foundation for Aging Research, the National Institute for Aging, and the Alzheimer's Association.

Although they are working with aging rats, their findings may have implications for the many post-menopausal women now on estrogen replacement therapy, Williams said.

"While most people are aware that estrogen treatment acts on cholesterol synthesis and bone growth," Williams noted, "they are unaware that it acts on the brain as well."

Information is lacking on such effects, she said, because "living for another 25 or 30 years after menopause is a very recent phenomenon in the history of humankind. Aging without estrogen may be the natural state, but it also may be like the loss of any other hormone. Perhaps what you should do is replace it."

Einstein said their research also suggests a possible mechanism to explain recent findings that women on hormone replacement therapy, and with a family history of Alzheimer's disease, are less likely than their untreated siblings to get the disease. The Duke scientists theorized that treating Alzheimer's patients with estrogens might help protect against neuro
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Contact: Dennis Meredith
meredithd@mail01.adm.duke.edu
919-681-8054
Duke University
20-Nov-1996