Gingipains and Alzheimer’s disease

To investigate the Braak Hypothesis, Dr. Jeitner tests whether bacterial proteins in the infected mouth travel to the brain via neurons that regulate chewing. Currently, his interests center on gingipains, bacterial proteases that must aggregate to pass along the trigeminal nerve to the brain. Dr. Jeitner has demonstrated that tissue transglutaminase (TG2), one of the mouth’s transglutaminases, catalyzes this reaction.