[mattkrause]

> plaques are the "root cause

The amyloid hypothesis has been pretty popular for ~25 years, and it's pretty clear that the plaques have something to do with Alzheimers, but it's been a absolute disaster as a treatment target. It feels very much like treating a fever by slathering the patient in antiperspirant.

Biogen announced this morning that they're giving up on Phase III trials of aducanumab, an antibody that was supposed to target and remove the plaques (their stock is doing...badly as a result). https://www.reuters.com/article/us-biogen-alzheimers/biogen-...

There were two other big failures last year here too, as this nice little Nature News piece describes: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05719-4