Tau protein links memory to DNA damage response
The tau protein, best known for its role in Alzheimer’s disease, appears to be involved in how neurons respond to DNA damage during cell cycle activation.
Tau has a well-established job in neurons: it stabilises the internal skeleton of the cell. In Alzheimer’s and related diseases, tau clumps into abnormal structures that damage the cell. Recent research showed tau also plays a role in encoding long-term memories. Now an additional finding links tau to the cellular response to DNA damage.
The researchers describe how tau influences cell cycle-related processes in neurons exposed to DNA damage. Neurons normally do not divide after development. Yet they sometimes activate division-related processes, and this is associated with neurodegeneration.
Two roles, one protein
The combination of functions makes tau a protein with multiple faces. On one side, it supports normal neuronal processes including memory formation. On the other, it becomes involved in pathological processes when its behaviour changes. The boundary between those two roles matters for therapy: a treatment that suppresses tau could also interfere with its normal functions.
That challenge is not new in Alzheimer’s research, but it becomes sharper as more tau functions are identified. Precisely modulating specific tau roles without disrupting others has become an increasingly urgent question.
Aging as context
DNA damage accumulates with age, especially in non-dividing cells like neurons. If tau contributes to the response to that damage, then its function shifts as we age. The build-up of tau problems in older age is then not only a result of changed tau structures, but also of a changed environment in which tau must operate. That reframes how we should think about tau-related disease.