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Corinne Lasmezas is a French neurologist who joined Scripps in Florida in
June 2005.
Since
the mid-90's ,
she has been studying Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), the human form of bovine
spongiform encephalopathy (“mad cow disease”), using dozens of
monkeys and hundreds of mice in experiments. In her studies, animals were
injected (either intravenously or orally) with brain tissue from infected
humans, cows, sheep or other monkeys. The animals were then observed as the
disease progressed. After an incubation period, the animals began to show
signs of the neurological disease. Lasmezas noted that the animal's suffering
began with behaviors such as nervousness, teeth grinding and poor coordination,
but the animals also suffered blindness, paralysis, loss of muscle coordination
and seizures. Many animals suffered from the disease for several months before
being killed and dissected.
At
Scripps, she continues her work using animals in studying CJD and other prion
diseases.
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