Caffeine-based drugs may keep Parkinson's at bay

Zee Media Bureau

New Delhi: In another addition to the field of medicine, experts have developed novel caffeine-based chemical compounds that can be helpful in preventing Parkinson's disease.

Parkinson's disease attacks the nervous system, causing uncontrolled shakes, muscle stiffness, and slow, imprecise movement, chiefly in middle-aged and elderly people.

Researchers from the University of Saskatchewan in Canada focused on a protein called a-synuclein (AS), which is involved in dopamine regulation.

In Parkinson's sufferers, AS gets misfolded into a compact structure associated with the death of dopamine-producing neurons. AS appears to act like a prion disease.

In prion diseases, one mis-folded protein triggers mis-folding in others, spreading like falling dominos.

(With PTI inputs)