Three new CJD cases as scientists push ahead

With an apparent cluster of three male cases of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease being reported in Kent and government scientists investigating three further suspected cases among British women, further evidence on whether prion diseases such as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) may cross species barriers is reported by a team of Oxford University scientists in Nature (380:675).

Dr Mark Pagel, research fellow in Oxford's department of zoology, and his team, funded by the Medical Research Council, studied the gene for the prion protein. It is found in the brain of all adult …