Breaking down beliefs

Researchers at the Genentech Inc. unit of Roche are challenging the widely held belief that the blood-brain barrier (BBB) breaks down in Alzheimer's disease to cause neurodegeneration and acts as a gateway for delivery of therapeutic antibodies. Instead, they claim the barrier remains intact and argue that designing drugs to enter by active transport will work better than the common approach, which assumes diffusion through the leaky membrane.

The team published its findings last month in Neuron, and the company is moving toward developing bispecific antibodies that use the endothelial transferrin receptors to get better brain penetration. ...