Olivia Belbin

Alzheimer’s disease can begin to cause changes in the brain many years before the first symptoms appear. Now, a study by the Sant Pau Research Institute (IR Sant Pau) has identified a blood protein that could help detect these changes in people with Down syndrome, who are at particularly high risk of developing the disease. The researchers analysed 131 people and found that levels of β-synuclein, a protein involved in communication between neurons, are already elevated in adults with Down syndrome who have not yet developed symptoms.

The difference becomes more pronounced as the disease progresses: β-synuclein levels are 2.82 times higher in the early stages and 3.67 times higher in people with dementia. Published in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia, the findings suggest that this protein could help researchers understand when the deterioration of connections between neurons begins, one of the early processes involved in Alzheimer’s disease.

The research is led by Olivia Belbin, head of the Molecular Neurodegeneration Group at IR Sant Pau. Born in the United Kingdom, she graduated in Neuroscience and earned a PhD in Molecular Biomedical Sciences from the University of Nottingham. She joined Sant Pau Hospital in 2011, having previously worked at the Mayo Clinic in the United States. In 2014, she established her own research programme, focused on identifying markers of synaptic degeneration to better understand the early stages of neurodegenerative diseases.