"For my neuroscience and senior honors capstone project, I’ve been traveling to Washington University School of Medicine 2-3 times a week to work in Dr. David Holtzman’s Alzheimer Disease (AD) research lab. I joined a team studying an oxysterol, 25-hydroxycholesterol (25-HC), and whether it plays a role in protecting against AD or exacerbating the disease’s pathology. AD is a learning and memory neurodegenerative disease defined by a variety of neurological changes, including aggregated hyperphosphorylated tau protein in the brain which causes neurodegeneration. We currently don’t have great methods for treating Alzheimer’s Disease and the burden on the health care system is enormous — it’s estimated that about $300 billion are spent on the 5.8 million individuals with AD, making AD research extremely important.

After crossing mice to generate the desired genotypes, we measured hippocampal volume, entorhinal cortex volume, and ventricle volume across all models. We found that 25-HC modulates the tau-mediated neurodegeneration seen in AD, particularly in female mice. We also found that this relationship is dependent on ApoE, which is a specific gene locus in humans shown to be implicated to AD. This means that 25-HC and its upstream enzymatic regulator. CH25H may be viable therapeutic targets for AD, and we must continue to move forward with new studies to better elucidate this relationship."