PMID: 16649845May 3, 2006Paper

Neuropathologic changes in Alzheimer's disease: potential targets for treatment

The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry
G L Wenk

Abstract

The cognitive symptoms of Alzheimer's disease (AD) are believed to be caused not only by the loss of neurons in the cholinergic and glutamatergic neural systems but also by the irregular functioning of surviving neurons in these 2 systems. Aberrant cholinergic functioning in AD has been linked to deficits in the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, while AD-related abnormalities in glutamatergic signaling have been attributed to excitotoxicity caused by the persistent, low-level stimulation of glutamatergic neurons via the chronic influx of Ca(2+) ions through the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor calcium channel. Glutamatergic abnormalities in AD can be corrected to some extent by the NMDA receptor antagonist memantine, an agent whose therapeutic efficacy is believed to be related to its low to moderate level of affinity for the NMDA receptor calcium channel, a characteristic that allows memantine to prevent excessive glutamatergic stimulation while still permitting normal glutamate-mediated neurotransmission to take place. Although the mechanism underlying the chronic stimulation of glutamatergic neurons in AD has yet to be elucidated, one hypothesis is that the characteristic neuropathologic features of AD -- beta-amyloid depo...Continue Reading

Related Concepts

Related Feeds

Basal Forebrain- Circuits

Basal forebrain is a region in the brain important for production of acetylcholine and is the major cholinergic output of the CNS. Discover the latest research on circuits in the basal forebrain here.

© 2022 Meta ULC. All rights reserved