Could a cure for Alzheimer’s be closer than we think? Some great work being done right here in St. Louis at Washington University suggests it could be. This St. Louis Alzheimer’s research is looking at amyloid as a potential key to Alzheimer’s treatment, prevention, and even a cure.
Amyloid plaques and Alzheimer’s
Before diving into the research, let’s talk about amyloid and Alzheimer’s. Amyloid is a protein in the brain. In certain cases, it can clump together and form what are known as plaques. The plaques (also sometimes referred to as beta-amyloid plaques) are a hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease in the brain.
The fact that there is a connection between plaques and Alzheimer’s disease is well-established, but researchers are still working to understand more about the nature of this relationship. What we do know is that amyloid can start clumping into plaques as much as 20 years before someone experiences their first noticeable symptoms of Alzheimer’s or dementia.
So what is being done with this information? In short, quite a bit. Anti-amyloid drugs have been studied for decades. In recent years two different anti-amyloid drugs have been approved by the FDA to treat mild cognitive impairment, and prevent cognitive decline from worsening. These Alzheimer’s disease treatments are donanemab and lecanemab.
But is there potential for these anti-amyloids to be doing more, earlier, and possibly being used not just as a treatment but for Alzheimer’s prevention? That’s where the study at Washington University in St. Louis comes in.
Washington University’s Alzheimer’s Prevention Study
The new research from Washington University (WashU) was published in The Lancet Neurology in March 2025. It suggested that anti-amyloid drugs could not only treat existing Alzheimer’s disease, but prevent Alzheimer’s symptoms from ever taking hold in the brain in the first place.
The clinical trial focused on individuals who were destined to develop early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. They all had a rare genetic mutation that led to overproduction of amyloid in the brain, essentially guaranteeing that they would develop Alzheimer’s disease by their 50s.
For the participants who took the anti-amyloid drug the longest and had no dementia symptoms when the trial started, the treatment cut their risk of developing Alzheimer’s in half: From nearly 100% to 50%.
These results suggest that removing amyloid plaques from the brain early, even before someone is experiencing any cognitive symptoms, could help delay the onset or lower the severity of dementia they develop. And while this research looked at one specific population, it can inform future research that applies more broadly to the prevention and treatment of all forms of Alzheimer’s disease.
Next Steps for Alzheimer’s Research
What’s next? These promising findings can be used to guide future research that continues to help us get closer to a cure for Alzheimer’s disease.
Currently, the researchers who conducted the WashU study have turned their attention to even younger participants. They are working to see if preventing the accumulation of amyloid before it begins can prevent Alzheimer’s disease from taking hold entirely.
It’s great to see that amongst the vast medical research being conducted in St. Louis, there is some encouraging progress for Alzheimer’s disease treatment. Amyloid and Alzheimer’s have a relationship that is still being studied, but that could be very important to developing a cure for Alzheimer’s and dementia. And the Washington University research published earlier this year certainly helps us get one step closer.
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