WHERE protection against Alzheimer’s is concerned, you can have too much of a good thing. If you inherit one copy of a particular gene mutation it seems to protect you from Alzheimer’s. With a copy from each parent, you may be in trouble.
Fabrizio Tagliavini of the Carlo Besta National Neurological Institute in Milan, Italy, and colleagues discovered the mutation in a 44-year-old man with signs of early-onset Alzheimer’s who didn’t have the usual gene mutations.
Both he and a younger sister with mild cognitive problems, have two copies of a mutation in a gene called APP, while relatives…
