An investigation by researchers from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in the US has filled in a missing link between the toxic build-up of proteins in the neurodegenerative condition Parkinson’s disease and the death of critical brain cells.

The result of three years of research, the discovery connects alpha-synuclein proteins to a breakdown in mitochondrial function, both previously linked to Parkinson’s.

“We’ve uncovered a harmful interaction between proteins that damages the brain’s cellular powerhouses, called mitochondria,” says neuroscientist Xin Qi.