Ketamine abuse has been identified as a contributing factor to memory loss, according to researchers at Chinese University, in what they say is a pioneering study.
The HK$2 million study, sponsored by the government's Beat Drugs Fund, could be the world's first scientific study on ketamine's impact on the brain's neurons. Its findings are to be published in the medical journal Microscopy Research and Technique in the coming months.
The researchers, over two years, conducted a series of experiments by injecting ketamine into monkeys and mice for six months and then monitoring their behavioural and cognitive changes.
Lead researcher David Yew Tai-wai, a professor of anatomy at the school of biomedical sciences, said the study showed for the first time that ketamine abuse could contribute to 'one of the two cardinal hallmarks' of Alzheimer's disease.
People who are in the early stages of Alzheimer's often show symptoms of memory loss. As the disease progresses, sufferers also show signs of confusion, irritability and aggression.
Dr Yew said a protein in the neurons, known as 'tau', was found to have undergone a chemical change - researchers said it had become 'tangled' - three months after the monkeys and mice had received daily injections of ketamine.