New treatment method for Huntington's disease on the cards?

In what could come as good news for patients suffering from Huntington's disease, scientists from the UK and USA have discovered a new method to treat the neurodegenerative disease that affects muscle coordination and leads to cognitive decline and dementia, and eventually death. In two separate studies, the researchers say their findings could potentially help slow down the development of Huntington's disease as well as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases. The research is presented in the journal Current Biology.

Experts say Huntington's is an inherited disease of the central nervous system. Brain cells are progressively degenerated, leading to a person's inability to walk, talk and even think logically. Around 1 in 10 000 people suffer from this debilitating disease.

In the first study, led by the University of Leicester in the UK, the researchers stopped the development of neurodegeneration linked to Huntington's disease by targeting a specific enzyme - kynurenine 3-monooxygenase, KMO - in fruit flies. Flaviano Giorgini and Charalambos Kyriacou and their team directly manipulated metabolites in the KMO cellular pathway with drugs in order to manipulate the symptoms the flies displayed.