Current Alzheimer Research - Volume 12, Issue 10, 2015

Aims: Hypertension, a risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease (AD), is a treatable condition, which offers possibilities for prevention of AD. Elevated angiotensin II (AngII) is an important cause of essential hypertension. AngII has deleterious effects on endothelial function and cerebral blood flow (CBF), which may contribute to AD. AngII blocking agents can thus provide potential candidates to reduce AD risk factors in hypertensive Read More

Transgenic APPswe/PS1dE9 mice modeling Alzheimer’s disease demonstrate ongoing accumulation of β-amyloid fragments resulting in formation of amyloid plaques that starts at the age of 4-5 months. Buildup of β-amyloid fragments is accompanied by impairment of muscarinic transmission that becomes detectable at this age, well before the appearance of cognitive deficits that manifest around the age of 12 months. We ha Read More

During adult life, hippocampus is an important brain region involved in neurogenesis. The generation and cell death of newly generated neuronal cells in this region have critical roles in brain maintenance and alterations in these processes are seen in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). For the purpose of carrying out a neuroregenerative strategy, we propose a novel approach based on the encapsulation of vascular endothelial growth f Read More

The corpus callosum is the largest commissural fiber connecting left and right hemisphere of the brain. Emerging evidence suggests that a variety of abnormalities detected in the microstructure of this white matter fiber can be an early event in Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathology. However, little is known about tissue characteristics of these abnormalities and how these abnormalities evolve during AD progression. In this stud Read More

Both the hippocampus and amygdala are early vulnerable brain regions in the development of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). However, previous studies mainly focused on characterizing the hippocampus in the pathophysiology of AD, leaving the amygdala less explored. Here, we characterized the structures and functions of neurons in the hippocampus and amygdala of young (2, 3 and 4 months of age) APP/PS1 double transgenic ( Read More

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disorder that gradually induces cognitive deficit. Working memory deficits have been previously reported in AD and Amyloid-β peptide (Aβ) is regarded as a causative factor for the impairments. Accumulating evidence has identified that neuronal ensemble activity as well as functional connectivity among neurons encode and process information in normal brain. How Aβ c Read More

Cortical hubs that link functionally specialized neural systems are crucial for cognition. Evidence suggests that the location and organization of hubs are related to Alzheimer’s disease (AD). However, two issues remain unclear: (i) where and how hubs change in AD, and (ii) whether hubs could be a potential pre-diagnosis biomarker for mild cognitive impairment (MCI) - a prodromal phase of AD. Accordingly, we examined the functi Read More

Changes in rRNA and rDNA expression have been associated with cellular and organism aging and have been linked to Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathogenesis. In this study, we investigated the mRNA expression of ribosomal genes (28S/18S) and β-amyloid precursor protein (APP) in different post mortem brain tissue regions (the entorhinal and auditory cortices and the hippocampus) of AD patients and elderly control subjects Read More

Chromosomal alterations as a sign of genetic instability are a feature of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Assessment of the genetic instability of non-neuronal cells of AD patients may provide a method to diagnose or monitor prognosis of the disease. Considering the importance of X chromosome alterations in the possible etiology of AD females, we used fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) for the centromere region of the X chr Read More

In the central nervous system Hsp70s seems to have a protective role in repair and removal of cellular proteins damaged by stress conditions. A protective role of Hsp70 was also shown in Alzheimer Disease. The HSP70-1 +190 G/C polymorphism is located in the gene 5’UTR region and it is implicated in alteration of the transcription binding factor; HSP70-2 +1267 A/G causes a silent mutation in the coding region and it seem Read More

Background: It has been reported that periodontitis is associated with Alzheimer’s disease. However, the association between paranasal sinusitis and Alzheimer’s disease has not been studied, although olfactory dysfunction frequently precedes the progress of dementia or Alzheimer’s disease. Methods: We studied 783 patients (283 men, 500 women; mean age 77.0 ± 7.9 years) who visited the Center for Comprehensive Care a Read More