Acumen Pharmaceuticals, Inc — Department of Health and Human Services SBIR Phase I: DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): In the United States in 2013, 5.2 million people are
Acumen Pharmaceuticals, Inc — SBIR Phase I award from Department of Health and Human Services.
- Amount
- $176,145
- Agency
- Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health
- Program / Phase
- SBIR · Phase I
- Solicitation
- PA13-234
- NAICS
- —
- Place of performance
- CA
- Period
- —
Description
DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): In the United States in 2013, 5.2 million people are estimated to suffer from Alzheimer's disease, with as many as 50% being undiagnosed [Alzheimer's Association 2013]. Current diagnostic technologies for Alzheimer's disease are based on the levels of total soluble amyloid beta (Abeta) peptide in plasma and/or cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), levels of tau and phosphorylated tau protein in CSF, or the levels of insoluble amyloid plaques in the brain [e.g., Mulder 2010]. None of the current Alzheimer's disease diagnostic/biomarker technologies detect or quantitate soluble Abeta oligomers. Soluble Abeta oligomers, in contrast to monomeric Abeta or fibrillic Abeta (amyloid plaques), are primary synaptic toxins that cause acute, but reversible, cognitive deficits and the chronic neuronal degeneration of Alzheimer's disease [Walsh 2007, Roychaudhuri 2009, Benilova 2012]. Although the presence of soluble Abeta oligomers in postmortem extracts of human brain tissue is well documented,