According to a study published by researchers from the University of Pittsburgh in Nature Medicine, they found that star-shaped brain cells called astrocytes were the key to swaying the pendulum in Alzheimers disease progression.

The researchers observed that only those who had a combination of amyloid burden and blood markers of abnormal astrocyte activation, or reactivity, showed progression to symptomatic Alzheimers in the future. In the study, they tested the blood of more than 1,000 cognitively unimpaired elderly people with and without amyloid pathology.

They examined blood samples from participants in three separate investigations of cognitively normal older persons for biomarkers of astrocyte reactivity, such as glial fibrillary acidic protein, or GFAP, as well as the presence of pathogenic tau.

Based on the findings, the researchers concluded that a considerable proportion of amyloid-positive individuals do not advance to clinical manifestations of Alzheimers and that amyloid positivity alone does not establish an individuals eligibility for treatment. 

(Source: https://www.daijiworld.com/news/newsDisplay?newsID=1084869 )