scispace - formally typeset
Journal ArticleDOI

Detection of oligomeric forms of α-synuclein protein in human plasma as a potential biomarker for Parkinson’s disease

Reads0
Chats0
TLDR
A novel ELISA method is developed that detects only oligomeric “soluble aggregates” of α‐syn in human plasma as a potential biomarker for Parkinson's disease and offers new opportunities for developing diagnostic tests for PD and related diseases.
Abstract
To date there is no accepted clinical diagnostic test for Parkinson's disease (PD) based on biochemical analysis of blood or cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). alpha-Synuclein (alpha-syn) protein has been linked to the pathogenesis of PD with the discovery of mutations in the gene encoding alpha-syn in familial cases with early-onset PD. Lewy bodies and Lewy neurites, which constitute the main pathological features in the brains of patients with sporadic PD and dementia with Lewy bodies, are formed by the conversion of soluble monomers of alpha-syn into insoluble aggregates. We recently reported the presence of alpha-syn in normal human blood plasma and in postmortem CSF. Here, we investigated whether alpha-syn can be used as a biomarker for PD. We have developed a novel ELISA method that detects only oligomeric "soluble aggregates" of alpha-syn. Using this ELISA, we report the presence of significantly elevated (P=0.002) levels of oligomeric forms of alpha-syn in plasma samples obtained from 34 PD patients compared with 27 controls; 52% (95% confidence intervals 0.353-0.687) of the PD patients displayed signals >0.5 OD with our ELISA assay in comparison to only 14.8% (95% confidence intervals 0.014-0.281) for the control cases. An analysis of the test's diagnostic value revealed a specificity of 0.852 (95% confidence intervals 0.662-0.958), sensitivity of 0.529 (95% confidence intervals 0.351-0.702) and a positive predictive value of 0.818 (95% confidence intervals 0.597-0.948). These observations offer new opportunities for developing diagnostic tests for PD and related diseases and for testing therapeutic agents aimed at preventing or reversing the aggregation of alpha-syn.

read more

Citations
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI

The Parkinson Progression Marker Initiative (PPMI)

TL;DR: The Parkinson Progression Marker Initiative (PPMI) is a comprehensive observational, international, multi-center study designed to identify PD progression biomarkers both to improve understanding of disease etiology and course and to provide crucial tools to enhance the likelihood of success of PD modifying therapeutic trials.
Journal ArticleDOI

Cell-produced alpha-synuclein is secreted in a calcium-dependent manner by exosomes and impacts neuronal survival.

TL;DR: The results show for the first time that cell-produced α- Synuclein is secreted via an exosomal, calcium-dependent mechanism and suggest that α-synuclein secretion serves to amplify and propagate Parkinson's disease-related pathology.
Journal ArticleDOI

α-Synuclein propagates from mouse brain to grafted dopaminergic neurons and seeds aggregation in cultured human cells

TL;DR: In vivo transfer of α-syn between host cells and grafted dopaminergic neurons in mice overexpressing human α- syn and results suggest that α- Syn propagation is a key element in the progression of Parkinson disease pathology.
Journal ArticleDOI

Exosomal cell-to-cell transmission of alpha synuclein oligomers

TL;DR: The data suggest that αsyn may be secreted via different secretory pathways, and hypothesize that exosome-mediated release of αsyn oligomers is a mechanism whereby cells clear toxic α synuclein oligomers when autophagic mechanisms fail to be sufficient.
Journal ArticleDOI

Different Species of α-Synuclein Oligomers Induce Calcium Influx and Seeding

TL;DR: The data indicate that inhibition of early α- syn aggregation events would consequently prevent all α-syn oligomer related toxicities, which has important implications for the development of disease-modifying drugs for the treatment of PD and other synucleinopathies.
References
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI

Mutation in the α-synuclein gene identified in families with Parkinson's disease

TL;DR: A mutation was identified in the α-synuclein gene, which codes for a presynaptic protein thought to be involved in neuronal plasticity, in the Italian kindred and in three unrelated families of Greek origin with autosomal dominant inheritance for the PD phenotype.
Journal ArticleDOI

Naturally secreted oligomers of amyloid beta protein potently inhibit hippocampal long-term potentiation in vivo.

TL;DR: It is reported that natural oligomers of human Aβ are formed soon after generation of the peptide within specific intracellular vesicles and are subsequently secreted from the cell, indicating that synaptotoxic Aβ oligomers can be targeted therapeutically.
Journal ArticleDOI

Common Structure of Soluble Amyloid Oligomers Implies Common Mechanism of Pathogenesis

TL;DR: It is shown that all of the soluble oligomers tested display a common conformation-dependent structure that is unique to soluble oligomer regardless of sequence, suggesting they share a common mechanism of toxicity.
Related Papers (5)