Diffusible, highly bioactive oligomers represent a critical minority of soluble Aβ in Alzheimer's disease brain.

ABSTRACT: Significant data suggest that soluble Aβ oligomers play an important role in Alzheimer's disease (AD), but there is great confusion over what exactly constitutes an Aβ oligomer and which oligomers are toxic. Most studies have utilized synthetic Aβ peptides, but the relevance of these test tube experiments to the conditions that prevail in AD is uncertain. A few groups have studied Aβ extracted from human brain, but they employed vigorous tissue homogenization which is likely to release insoluble Aβ that was sequestered in plaques during life. Several studies have found such extracts to possess disease-relevant activity and considerable efforts are being made to purify and better understand the forms of Aβ therein. Here, we compared the abundance of Aβ in AD extracts prepared by traditional

SUBMITTER: Hong W 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6647843 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature