{"id":1101,"date":"2020-08-26T09:33:00","date_gmt":"2020-08-26T09:33:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/clinlabint.3wstaging.nl\/discovery-of-neurotransmission-gene-may-pave-way-for-early-detection-of-alzheimers-disease\/"},"modified":"2021-01-08T11:09:37","modified_gmt":"2021-01-08T11:09:37","slug":"discovery-of-neurotransmission-gene-may-pave-way-for-early-detection-of-alzheimers-disease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/discovery-of-neurotransmission-gene-may-pave-way-for-early-detection-of-alzheimers-disease\/","title":{"rendered":"Discovery of neurotransmission gene may pave way for early detection of Alzheimer\u2019s Disease"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>A new Tel Aviv University study identified a gene coding for a protein that turns off neurotransmission signalling, which contributes to Alzheimer\u2019s disease (AD).<\/div>\n<div>The gene, called RGS2 (Regulator of Protein Signalling 2), has never before been implicated in AD. The researchers report that lower RGS2 expression in AD patient cells increases their sensitivity to toxic effects of amyloid-\u00df. The study may lead to new avenues for diagnosing Alzheimer\u2019s disease \u2014 possibly a blood test \u2014 and new therapies to halt the progression of the disease.<\/div>\n<div>The research was led by Dr. David Gurwitz of the Department of Human Molecular Genetics and Biochemistry at TAU\u2019s Sackler School of Medicine and Prof. Illana Gozes, the incumbent of the Lily and Avraham Gildor Chair for the Investigation of Growth Factors; Head of the Elton Laboratory for Molecular Neuroendocrinology at TAU\u2019s Sackler School of Medicine; and a member of TAU\u2019s Adams Super Center for Brain Studies and TAU\u2019s Sagol School of Neuroscience.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div>\u201cAlzheimer\u2019s researchers have until now zeroed in on two specific pathological hallmarks of the chronic neurodegenerative disease: deposits of misfolded amyloid-\u00df (A\u00df) peptide plaques, and phosphorylated tau protein neurofibrillary tangles found in diseased brains,\u201d Dr. Gurwitz said. \u201cBut recent studies suggest amyloid-? plaques are also a common feature of healthy older brains. This raises questions about the central role of A? peptides in Alzheimer\u2019s disease pathology.\u201d<\/div>\n<div>The researchers pinpointed a common suspect \u2014 the RGS2 gene \u2014 by combining genome-wide gene expression profiling of Alzheimer\u2019s disease blood-derived cell lines with data-mining of previously published gene expression datasets. They found a reduced expression of RGS2 in Alzheimer\u2019s disease blood-derived cell lines, then validated the observation by examining datasets derived from blood samples and post-mortem brain tissue samples from Alzheimer\u2019s patients.<\/div>\n<div>\u201cSeveral genes and their protein products are already known to be implicated in Alzheimer\u2019s disease pathology, but RGS2 has never been studied in this context,\u201d Dr. Gurwitz said. \u201cWe now propose that whether or not A\u00df is a primary culprit in Alzheimer\u2019s disease, neuroprotective mechanisms activated during early disease phases lead to reduced RGS2 expression.\u201d<\/div>\n<div>The new TAU study furthermore proposes that reduced RGS2 expression increases the susceptibility of brain neurons to the potentially damaging effects of A\u00df.<\/div>\n<div>\u201cWe found that reduced expression of RGS2 is already noticeable in blood cells during mild cognitive impairment, the earliest phase of Alzheimer\u2019s,\u201d Dr. Gurwitz observed. \u201cThis supported our theory that the reduced RGS2 expression represents a \u2018protective mechanism\u2019 triggered by ongoing brain neurodegeneration.\u201d<\/div>\n<div>The team further found that the reduced expression of RGS2 was correlated with increased A\u00df neurotoxicity. It acted like a double-edged sword, allowing the diseased brain to function with fewer neurons, while increasing damage to it by accumulating misfolded A\u00df.<\/div>\n<div>\u201cOur new observations must now be corroborated by other research groups,\u201d Dr. Gurwitz concluded. \u201cThe next step will be to design early blood diagnostics and novel therapeutics to offset the negative effects of reduced expression of the RGS2 protein in the brain.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><\/div>\n<div>American Friends of Tel Aviv University&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><link http:\/\/tinyurl.com\/h6nz7pf _blank external-link-new-window \"Opens internal link in current window\">http:\/\/tinyurl.com\/h6nz7pf<\/link><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new Tel Aviv University study identified a gene coding for a protein that turns off neurotransmission signalling, which contributes to Alzheimer\u2019s disease (AD). The gene, called RGS2 (Regulator of Protein Signalling 2), has never before been implicated in AD. The researchers report that lower RGS2 expression in AD patient cells increases their sensitivity to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-e-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1101"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1101\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}