What came first, the plaque or the damaged neuron?

Darkfrog submitted, created time 9 months 2 weeks (www.nature.com)

By using cranial window surgery in lab mice, researchers from Harvard Medical have managed to figure out whether it is the neuron damage that causes (or at least precedes) the plaque in Alzheimer's patients or the other way around.

The results imply that it is the plaques that cause microglial accumulation, and that the microglia restrain the growth of these plaques.

The part that seems most interesting to me is the speed at which the plaques form. Very rarely do discussions of the studies talk about the speed

Submit comment | Blog It | Email It | Keywords: plaques microglia Alzheimers disease Alzheimers causality causation

Effect of Tuberculosis on the Survival of Women Infected with Human Immunodeficiency Virus

alpha submitted, created time 1 year 6 months (aje.oxfordjournals.org)

”Evidence regarding the effect of tuberculosis (TB) disease on progression of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) disease is inconclusive."

1 comment | Blog It | Email It | Keywords: acquired immunodeficiency syndrome causality disease progression HIV infections models, statistical survival analysis tuberculosis women