"Scrapie" is the old Scottish shepherds' name for a disease of their sheep which has been known for several centuries. It is the original example of a group of diseases, known as the "transmissible ...

Many neurodegenerative diseases involve a common pattern of protein misfolding, aggregation, and toxicity. Though the identity of the actual polypeptide varies for each disease, the outcome converges ...

Prions are biological anomalies – self-replicating, not-alive little particles that can misfold into an unstoppable juggernaut of fatal disease. Prions don't contain genes, and yet they make more of ...

If you’re familiar with the word prion than you probably associate it with dysfunction and disease. Prions infamously cause bovine spongiform encephalopathy, commonly known as mad cow disease, as well ...

Prions are the smallest and possibly the most dangerous of all infectious pathogens. They are also unique in that they contain no genetic material at all — just proteins. But as guest writer Steve ...

Prions–the name comes from “proteinaceous infectious particle”–were big news in the 1980s, when it became clear that these proteins caused disease. But more than 30 years after they were discovered, ...

In the novel Cat's Cradle, an eccentric scientist develops a substance called Ice-9 that crystallizes every drop of water it touches. Eventually, it freezes the world's oceans. Now, 40 years after ...

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. Infectious proteins called prions — which cause devastating brain diseases including "mad cow" ...

People with the rare and fatal brain disorder Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) show signs of the disease in their eyes, according to a new study. The study found evidence of prions — the infectious ...

A mysterious neurological disease was killing women and children in the Eastern Highlands of Papua New Guinea. Patients in the final stages experienced uncontrollable outbursts of laughter, earning ...

In functional prions, it is regulated by a physiological signal. Secondly, in pathological prions, once the prions assume an aggregated self-perpetuating form, prion proteins then kill the cell. They ...