Our recent news item on Emory pathologist Keqiang Ye’s obesity-related research (Molecule from trees helps female mice only resist weight gain) understates how many disease models the proto-drug he and his colleagues have discovered, 7,8-dihydroxyflavone, can be beneficial in. We do mention that Ye’s partners in Australia and Shanghai are applying to begin phase I clinical trials with a close relative of 7,8-dihydroxyflavone in neurodegenerative diseases.

Ye’s 2010 PNAS paper covered models of Parkinson’s, stroke and seizure. Later publications take on animal models of depression, Alzheimer’s, fear learning, hearing loss and peripheral nerve injury. Although those findings begin to sound too good to be true, outside laboratories have been confirming the results (not 100 percent positive, but nothing’s perfect).  Plenty of drugs don’t make it from animal models into the clinic, but this is a solid body of work so far.