Eugenia Trushina, PhD: Mitochondria as a Therapeutic Target for Alzheimer

“How can we think about mitochondria as a therapeutic target?”

At the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation’s 19th Annual Conference in Jersey City, New Jersey, Eugenia Trushina, PhD, an associate professor of neurology at Mayo Clinic Rochester, presented her and her colleagues work with a small molecule that targets mitochondria as a possible treatment for Alzheimer disease.

This novel approach to the condition has already been supported by feasibility trials. The compound she and her group are using, while not novel itself, is a Complex 1 inhibitor—not unlike metformin. Although, as Trushina would point out, unlike metformin, the inhibitor her group is working with does not have the blood brain barrier issues that metformin does. Thus far, there has been no evidence of off-target interactions with the new compound.

To discuss the possibility of mitochondrial targets in medicine, Trushina sat with NeurologyLive at the ADDF’s meeting.