Questions about alzheimer's data being blown up by the media....

 

If you needed another reason to hate western blots, you should check out this somewhat overstated piece in Science. It's like following Elizabeth Blik's Twitter where she takes apart images. 

The media is running wild with this piece, as if Amyloid plaques and large neural insolubility problems in neurological models don't exist, and that is not true at all. I'm definitely guilty of reading a quick news blurb on it and repeating it to some people before thinking about it. 

No joke, if you get these insoluble chunks from neurological diseases it is crazy how hard they are they are to break up so you can digest them. Someone I won't name here underestimated this a couple of years ago and may have set a new world record for EasySpray column consumption. This Explainer piece from I fucking love science puts it in context: 

Rather than being a big shakeup that questions a whole ton of things, the best I can tell this should just help clarify existing data. Toss out the assumption that AB-56 oligomer is important and that should help, right? Good thing we've been collecting data on all the peptides that are present, rather than using rabbit blood extracts bonded to the stuff from firefly butts to "measure" one thing at a time!