Assessing candidate serum biomarkers for Alzheimer's disease: a longitudinal study.

Because of the growing impact of late onset cognitive loss, considerable effort has been directed toward the development of improved diagnostic techniques for Alzheimer's disease (AD) that may pave the way for earlier (and more effective) therapeutic efforts. Serum-based biomarkers are the least expensive and invasive modality for screening and routine monitoring. We systematically reviewed the literature to assemble a list of serum biomarkers relevant to AD.

Deferiprone reduces amyloid-β and tau phosphorylation levels but not reactive oxygen species generation in hippocampus of rabbits fed a cholesterol-enriched diet.

Accumulation of amyloid-β (Aβ) peptide and the hyperphosphorylation of tau protein are major hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease (AD). The causes of AD are not well known but a number of environmental and dietary factors are suggested to increase the risk of developing AD. Additionally, altered metabolism of iron may have a role in the pathogenesis of AD.

Proteomic analysis of eccrine sweat: implications for the discovery of schizophrenia biomarker proteins.

Liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) and multiple reaction monitoring mass spectrometry (MRM-MS) proteomics analyses were performed on eccrine sweat of healthy controls, and the results were compared with those from individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia (SZ). This is the first large scale study of the sweat proteome. First, we performed LC-MS/MS on pooled SZ samples and pooled control samples for global proteomics analysis.

Mild cognitive impairment: prodromal Alzheimer's disease or something else?

The majority of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) studies use baseline and one follow-up measurement to determine the clinical course of the disorder. This report of MCI clinical course is based on the a statistical evaluation of multiple neurocognitive tests over a 60 month period in elderly normal and MCI cohorts. The data includes serial informant-based measures (Clinical Dementia Rating [CDR]) and a comprehensive battery of neuropsychological tests analyzed by two different regression methods.

In vivo iron quantification in collagenase-induced microbleeds in rat brain.

Brain microbleeds (BMB) are associated with chronic and acute cerebrovascular disease. Because BMB present in the brain is a source of potentially cytotoxic iron proportional to the volume of extravasated blood, BMB iron content is a potentially valuable biomarker both to assess tissue risk and small cerebral vessel health. We recently reported methods to quantify focal iron sources using phase images that were tested in phantoms and BMB in postmortem tissue.

Iron quantification of microbleeds in postmortem brain.

Brain microbleeds (BMB) are associated with chronic and acute cerebrovascular disease and present a source of pathologic iron to the brain proportional to extravasated blood. Therefore, BMB iron content is potentially a valuable biomarker. We tested noninvasive phase image methods to quantify iron content and estimate true source diameter (i.

Effect of cerebral amyloid angiopathy on brain iron, copper, and zinc in Alzheimer's disease.

Cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) is a vascular lesion associated with Alzheimer's disease (AD) present in up to 95% of AD patients and produces MRI-detectable microbleeds in many of these patients. It is possible that CAA-related microbleeding is a source of pathological iron in the AD brain. Because the homeostasis of copper, iron, and zinc are so intimately linked, we determined whether CAA contributes to changes in the brain levels of these metals.

The effect of formalin fixation on the levels of brain transition metals in archived samples.

Reports that iron, zinc and copper homeostasis are in aberrant homeostasis are common for various neurodegenerative diseases, particularly for Huntington's disease, Parkinson's disease, and Alzheimer's disease. Manipulating the levels of these elements in the brain through the application of chelators has been and continues to be tested therapeutically in clinical trials with mixed results. Much of the data indicating that these metals are abnormally concentrated in Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease brain tissue was generated through the analysis of post-mortem human tissue which was archived in formalin.