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Feb. 16 - Israeli esearchers at the Technion Israel Institute of Science have developed three innovative drugs for treating neurodegenerative diseases.

The drugs remove iron from the brain and thus prevent the creation of 'brain rust' which causes such diseases as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. The drugs, developed by Prof. Moussa Youdim of the Rappaport Faculty of Medicine at the Technion, in collaboration with the late Prof. Avraham Warshawsky, Prof. Mati Fridkin and doctoral student Hailin Zheng from China, have had their American and worldwide patents approved. The three drugs (M30, HLA-20 and VK-28) remove iron before it has a chance to cause 'brain rust' - a reaction in which active oxygen particles destroy brain cells. This destruction is one of the causes of such neurodegenerative diseases as Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, Huntington's and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig's disease. The researchers are currently negotiating with a number of American, British and Israeli companies concerning development of these drugs through the company Varinel.