dementia
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KAIST to Collaborate with AT&C to Take Dominance over Dementia
< Photo 1. (From left) KAIST Dean of the College of Natural Sciences Daesoo Kim, KAIST President Kwang Hyung Lee, AT&C Chairman Ki Tae Lee, AT&C CEO Jong-won Lee >
KAIST (President Kwang Hyung Lee) announced on January 9th that it signed a memorandum of understanding for a comprehensive mutual cooperation with AT&C (CEO Jong-won Lee) at its Seoul Dogok Campus to expand research investment and industry-academia cooperation in preparation for the future cutting-edge digital bio era.
Senile dementia is a rapidly increasing brain disease that affects 10% of the elderly population aged 65 and older, and approximately 38% of those aged 85 and older suffer from dementia. Alzheimer's disease is the most common dementia in the elderly and its prevalence has been increasing rapidly in the population of over 40 years of age. However, an effective treatment is yet to be found.
The Korean government is investing a total of KRW 1.1 trillion in dementia R&D projects from 2020 to 2029, with the goal of reducing the rate of increase of dementia patients by 50%. Since it takes a lot of time and money to develop effective and affordable medicinal dementia treatments, it is urgent to work on the development of digital treatments for dementia that can be applied more quickly.
AT&C, a digital healthcare company, has already received approval from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) for its device for antidepressant treatment based on transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) using magnetic fields and is selling it domestically and internationally. In addition, it has developed the first Alzheimer's dementia treatment device in Korea and received MFDS approval for clinical trials. After passing phase 1 to evaluate safety and phase 2 to test efficacy on some patients, it is currently conducting phase 3 clinical trials to test efficacy on a larger group of patients.
This dementia treatment device is equipped with a system that combines non-invasive electronic stimulations (TMS electromagnetic stimulator) and digital therapeutic prescription (cognitive learning programs) to provide precise, automated treatment by applying AI image analysis and robotics technology.
Through this agreement, KAIST and AT&C have agreed to cooperate with each other in the development of innovative digital treatment equipment for brain diseases. Through research collaboration with KAIST, AT&C will be able to develop technology that can be widely applied to Parkinson's disease, stroke, mild cognitive impairment, sleep disorders, etc., and will develop portable equipment that can improve brain function and prevent dementia at home by utilizing KAIST's wearable technology.
To this end, AT&C plans to establish a digital healthcare research center at KAIST by supporting research personnel and research expenses worth approximately 3 billion won with the goal of developing cutting-edge digital equipment within 3 years.
The digital equipment market is expected to grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 22.1% from 2023 to 2033, reaching a market size of $1.9209 trillion by 2033.
< Photo 2. (From left) Dean of the KAIST College of Natural Sciences Daesoo Kim, Professor Young-joon Lee, Professor Minee Choi of the KAIST Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, KAIST President Kwang Hyung Lee, Chairman Ki Tae Lee, CEO Jong-won Lee, and Headquarters Director Ki-yong Na of AT&C >
CEO Jong-won Lee said, “AT&C is playing a leading role in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease using TMS (transcranial magnetic stimulation) technology. Through this agreement with KAIST, we will do our best to create a new paradigm for brain disease treatment and become a platform company that can lead future medical devices and medical technology.”
Former Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Ki Tae Lee, a strong supporter of this R&D project, said, “Through this agreement with KAIST, we plan to prepare for a new future by combining the technologies AT&C has developed so far with KAIST’s innovative and differentiated technologies.”
KAIST President Kwang Hyung Lee emphasized, “Through this collaboration, KAIST expects to build a world-class digital therapeutics infrastructure for treating brain diseases and contribute greatly to further strengthening Korea’s competitiveness in the biomedical field.”
The signing ceremony was attended by KAIST President Kwang Hyung Lee, the Dean of KAIST College of Natural Sciences Daesoo Kim, AT&C CEO Lee Jong-won, and the current Chairman of AT&C, Ki Tae Lee, former Vice Chairman of Samsung Electronics.
2025.01.09 View 352 -
Simple Molecular Reagents to Treat Alzheimer’s Disease
- Researchers report minimalistic principles for designing small molecules with multiple reactivities against dementia. -
Sometimes the most complex problems actually have very simple solutions. A group of South Korean researchers reported an efficient and effective redox-based strategy for incorporating multiple functions into simple molecular reagents against neurodegenerative disorders. The team developed redox-active aromatic molecular reagents with a simple structural composition that can simultaneously target and modulate various pathogenic factors in complex neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease.
Alzheimer’s disease is one of the most prevalent neurodegenerative disorders, affecting one in ten people over the age of 65. Early-onset dementia also increasingly affects younger people.
A number of pathogenic elements such as reactive oxygen species, amyloid-beta, and metal ions have been suggested as potential causes of Alzheimer’s disease. Each element itself can lead to Alzheimer’s disease, but interactions between them may also aggravate the patient’s condition or interfere with the appropriate clinical care.
For example, when interacting with amyloid-beta, metal ions foster the aggregation and accumulation of amyloid-beta peptides that can induce oxidative stress and toxicity in the brain and lead to neurodegeneration.
Because these pathogenic factors of Alzheimer’s disease are intertwined, developing therapeutic agents that are capable of simultaneously regulating metal ion dyshomeostasis, amyloid-beta agglutination, and oxidative stress responses remains a key to halting the progression of the disease.
A research team led by Professor Mi Hee Lim from the Department of Chemistry at KAIST demonstrated the feasibility of structure-mechanism-based molecular design for controlling a molecule’s chemical reactivity toward the various pathological factors of Alzheimer’s disease by tuning the redox properties of the molecule.
This study, featured as the ‘ACS Editors’ Choice’ in the May 6th issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS), was conducted in conjunction with KAIST Professor Mu-Hyun Baik’s group and Professor Joo-Young Lee’s group at the Asan Medical Center.
Professor Lim and her collaborators rationally designed and generated 10 compact aromatic molecules presenting a range of redox potentials by adjusting the electronic distribution of the phenyl, phenylene, or pyridyl moiety to impart redox-dependent reactivities against the multiple pathogenic factors in Alzheimer’s disease.
During the team’s biochemical and biophysical studies, these designed molecular reagents displayed redox-dependent reactivities against numerous desirable targets that are associated with Alzheimer’s disease such as free radicals, metal-free amyloid-beta, and metal-bound amyloid-beta.
Further mechanistic results revealed that the redox properties of these designed molecular reagents were essential for their function. The team demonstrated that these reagents engaged in oxidative reactions with metal-free and metal-bound amyloid-beta and led to chemical modifications. The products of such oxidative transformations were observed to form covalent adducts with amyloid-beta and alter its aggregation.
Moreover, the administration of the most promising candidate molecule significantly attenuated the amyloid pathology in the brains of Alzheimer’s disease transgenic mice and improved their cognitive defects.
Professor Lim said, “This strategy is straightforward, time-saving, and cost-effective, and its effect is significant. We are excited to help enable the advancement of new therapeutic agents for neurodegenerative disorders, which can improve the lives of so many patients.”
This work was supported by the National Research Foundation (NRF) of Korea, the Institute for Basic Science (IBS), and the Asan Institute for Life Sciences.
Image credit: Professor Mi Hee Lim, KAIST
Image usage restrictions: News organizations may use or redistribute this image, with proper attribution, as part of the news coverage of this paper only.
Publication:
Kim, M. et al. (2020) ‘Minimalistic Principles for Designing Small Molecules with Multiple Reactivities against Pathological Factors in Dementia.’ Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS), Volume 142, Issue 18, pp.8183-8193. Available online at https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.9b13100
Profile:
Mi Hee Lim
Professor
miheelim@kaist.ac.kr
http://sites.google.com/site/miheelimlab
Lim Laboratory
Department of Chemistry
KAIST
Profile:
Mu-Hyun Baik
Professor
mbaik2805@kaist.ac.kr
https://baik-laboratory.com/
Baik Laboratory
Department of Chemistry
KAIST
Profile:
Joo-Yong Lee
Professor
jlee@amc.seoul.kr
Asan Institute for Life Sciences
Asan Medical Center
(END)
2020.05.11 View 13271