However, brain scans also showed that fewer brain lesions, damaged areas of tissue, formed in patients given the drug.

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Marchuk, a geneticist, is now ready to analyze "clean" DNA to conduct his experiments on inherited forms of brain lesions.

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Studies have linked gluten exposure in celiac patients with higher incidences of migraines, brain lesions, epilepsy, dementia, and learning disorders.

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Similarly, people with MS who had inflammatory lesions that were visible on brain scans also had faster retinal thinning than those without visible brain lesions.

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One of these, published in the Multiple Sclerosis Journal, showed brain lesions decreased in four of five patients three months into treatment, and rebounded two months after it ended.

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The defence had argued Bikubi was mentally ill when he carried out the killing, with a scan of his brain showing lesions which "probably contributed to an abnormal mental state".

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One possibility is that the tau protein causes the lesions in the brain.

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Another is that something else causes the lesions, and the tau protein is the brain's defence against that attack.

ECONOMIST: Dementia

It is more than a year away from getting approval to treat pain from bone cancer lesions and is targeting prostate, breast and brain tumors.

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Other autoimmune forms include dermatitis herpetiformis, which causes itchy skin lesions, and gluten ataxia, which affects brain tissue, resulting in unsteady gait and lack of motor control.

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