Journal of Alzheimers Disease & Parkinsonism
Open Access

Abstract

Neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer�s disease (AD) and Parkinson�s disease (PD) are currently considered as protein misfolding diseases. Determination of pathogenic proteins-mostly in Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) samples has been proposed as a disease biological marker that can be used for diagnosis and follow up. Furthermore there are some reports that describe protein �profiles� in CSF from carriers of neurodegenerative diseases. Due to difficulties in CSF sampling, it would be very useful to count with reliable biomarkers in peripheral fluids. Levels of peripheral Amyloid Beta (AB), AB precursor protein (APP) and tau, among others have been evaluated for AD diagnosis, while alpha-synuclein and DJ1 have been used as PD biomarkers. Previously we have evaluated peripheral blood platelets tau as a reliable AD biomarker. It has been performed measures and characterization of pathogenic proteins in blood and saliva obtained from neurodegenerative disease carriers (PD, AD and other protein misfolding diseases) by immunoblot and ELISA analyses. The specific peripheral protein profile that characterizes different neurodegenerative diseases is also described. Also, the relation between clinical disease features measured with standardized clinical scales like UPDRS and MMSE and levels of pathogenic proteins in blood and saliva is described. Finally, the relevance and implications of our analyses for diagnosis and further physiopathologycal knowledge of these diseases is discussed.

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