Mentor Fulbright Scholar to study way to treat Parkinson's disease

By Janet Podolak JPodolak@News-Herald.com @jpodolakatwork

Maribeth Joeright/MJoeright@News-Herald.com

Patrick Chirdon of Mentor has earned a year of study in Switzerland as a Fulbright Scholar.

One day Patrick Chirdon's name may be linked with a cure for Parkinson's disease, which today affects about 3 percent of the older population.

The Mentor man, who recently graduated with honors from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, is off to Switzerland next month as a Fulbright Scholar to continue research he began in Northeast Ohio.

Chirdon found evidence that a thyrotropin-releasing hormone, called TRH, protects brain cells in a way that could make it an effective treatment against Parkinson's disease.

But it's the mice in Switzerland, not its storied scenery, that has excited Chirdon the most. The laboratory where he'll work is the Brain Mind Institute at the Ecole Polytechinque Federale de Lausanne (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne) the only one in the world to develop a laboratory rat with a gene specific to his area of study.

"Their rat model is the only one to have the specific gene mutation (LRRK2) that's recognized as the most common genetic cause of Parkinson's," he said.

"I've come to the conclusion that drugs based on a structure of thyrotropin-releasing hormone may inhibit the LRRK2 enzyme and be an effective treatment for Parkinson's. It is my intent to study to effects of these drugs on these animals."

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Mentor Fulbright Scholar to study way to treat Parkinson's disease