The study, published in Nature, was led by Dr Todd Golde, a neuroscientist at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville , who said: “This broadens the notion of what drugs can do and therefore has wide-reaching implication for future drug discovery for many different disorders.”

Rebecca Wood, Chief Executive of the Alzheimer’s Research Trust, said: “This is an exciting step forward towards a potential new treatment for Alzheimer’s disease.

"There has been some recent promising research about non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) potentially reducing the risk of Alzheimer’s disease.

“This has brought us closer to understanding how some drugs affect the production of amyloid and its build up in the brain, which is thought to cause the breakdown of communications between brain cells and lead to the development of dementia.

“Scientists may be able to use this proof-of-principle research to develop a new class of drugs that specifically target this mechanismin an effort to slow or prevent the development of Alzheimer’s disease.

“Finding a way to prevent or delay the onset of dementia, even for a couple of years, would make a significant difference to the 700,000 people in the living with dementia and their families.