CNS & Neurological Disorders - Drug Targets (Formerly Current Drug Targets - CNS & Neurological Disorders) - Volume 10, Issue 2, 2011

Power Troubles in Parkinson's Disease Parkinson's disease (PD), which leads to motor and cognitive disabilities in 5 million people worldwide, is the second most common neurodegenerative disorder. Yet, a clear understanding of the mechanistic pathways and molecular machinery underlying the pathogenesis of this devastating disorder remains elusive, thus hampering the development of new therapeutic agents that are safe Read More

Stroke and arteriosclerosis with neurological consequences such as Alzheimer disease (AD) are two leading causes of age-associated disability, dementia, and death. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Center for Health Statistics recently reported that AD has surpassed diabetes as a leading cause of death. AD is now the sixth-leading cause of death in the United States. With our nation facing a Read More

Age-related dementias such as Alzheimer disease (AD) have been linked to vascular disorders like hypertension, diabetes and atherosclerosis. These risk factors cause ischemia, inflammation, oxidative damage and consequently reperfusion, which is largely due to reactive oxygen species (ROS) that are believed to induce mitochondrial damage. At higher concentrations, ROS can cause cell injury and death which occurs du Read More

The two major neuropathologic hallmarks of AD are extracellular amyloid beta (Aβ) plaques and intracellular neurofibrillary tangles (NFTs). A number of additional pathogenic mechanisms, possibly overlapping with Aβ plaques and NFTs formation, have been described, including inflammation, oxidative damage, iron dysregulation, and alterations in cholesterol metabolism. In this review, all of these mechanisms w Read More

Recent evidence has associated the aberrant, proximal re-expression of various cell cycle control elements with neuronal cell vulnerability in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, as a common chronic neurodegeneration. This phenomenon associated with oncogenic transduction pathways activation has attracted the interest of scientists all over the world for a few years now. The purpose of this paper is to outline Read More

Flavonoids are natural, plant-derived compounds which exert diverse biological activities, also valuable neuroprotective actions within the brain and currently are intensively studied as agents able to modulate neuronal function and to prevent age-related neurodegeneration. Among them, flavones isolated from Scutellaria baicalensis root exhibit strong neuroprotective effects on the brain and are not toxic in the broad rang Read More

There is growing scientific agreement that antioxidants, particularly the polyphenolic forms, may help lower the incidence of disease, such as certain cancers, cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases, DNA damage, or even have anti-aging properties. On the other hand, questions remain as to whether some antioxidants or phytochemicals potentially could do more harm than good, as an increase in glycation-medi Read More

Few targets for neuroprotection have been defined in Alzheimer's disease (AD). Recent data from the role of Wnt, insulin-like growth factor-1 and estradiol pathways in AD suggest some therapeutic targets for disease treatment, and have led us to evaluate the “common factors” in these pathways as further candidate targets. These data have led us to propose that glycogen synthase kinase-3 (GSK-3) inhibition appears to Read More

Therapeutic angiogenesis is a novel treatment for ischemic stroke, and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) is a key angiogenic and neuroprotective pharmacological candidate for therapy. However, the greatest challenge of preclinical studies is demonstrating that VEGF-based therapeutic angiogenesis is safe and effective for ischemic stroke patients. This review presents the following crucial questions which m Read More

Hypoxia/ischemia brain damage (HIBD) is one of the most common central nervous system insults in newborns. Brain repair following HIBD is closely associated with cellular processes such as cell survival, angiogenesis, and neurogenesis. In recent years, many studies have suggested that ginsenoside Rg1, one of the major active ingredients of ginseng, may increase neural viability, promote angiogenesis, and induce neuro Read More

Neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson's disease (PD), Alzheimer's disease (AD), Huntington's disease (HD) and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) are currently incurable pathologies with huge social and economic impacts closely related to the increasing of life expectancy in modern times. Although the clinical and neuropathological aspects of these debilitating disorders are distinct, they share a pattern of ne Read More

The present review is part II in a series (part I focuses on Parkinson's Disease) that addresses the value of natural product chemistry in the discovery of medicines for the treatment of neurodegenerative disorders. Data reviewed document that a host of products from plant species and derivatives have neuroprotectant effects in vitro and in vivo. In addition, besides neuroprotection, natural products also demonstrate bio Read More

The urokinase receptor (uPAR) is a multifunctional glycosylphosphatidylinositol-anchored protein that regulates important processes such as gene expression, cell proliferation, adhesion, migration, invasion, and metastasis. uPAR is an essential component of the plasminogen activation cascade, a protease receptor that binds the urokinase-type plasminogen activator. uPAR is also an adhesionmodulating receptor, and a signalling Read More