Lipids in Neurodegenerative Diseases
A special issue of International Journal of Molecular Sciences (ISSN 1422-0067). This special issue belongs to the section "Molecular Neurobiology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (20 September 2022) | Viewed by 20266
Special Issue Editors
Interests: Alzheimer’s disease; Parkinson disease; dystonia, movement disorders; neuropathology, proteinopathy; oligomers; lipids in neurodegenerative diseases
2. Laboratory of Resolution of Neuroinflammation, European Center for Brain Research (CERC)/IRCCS Santa Lucia Foundation, 00143 Rome, Italy
Interests: bioactive lipids; specialized proresolving lipid mediators (SPMs); immunology; innate and adaptive immunity; neuroinflammation; glial cells; multiple sclerosis (MS)
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Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Proteopathy (protein disease) is a term coined by Walker and LeVine (Neurobiology of Aging 21, 559–561, 2000) to define disparate diseases of the nervous system, characterized by malfunctioning endogenous protein monomers becoming conformationally unstable, prone to self-polymerize in small and large aggregates, known as oligomers and fibrils, producing neuronal damage. Each specific protein, in acquiring a strong tendency to self-aggregate, regardless of its physiological function, can underline a specific neurodegenerative process. Some of the most common neurodegenerative proteopathies are Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Parkinson’s disease (PD), Creutzfeldt–Jacob disease (CJD), dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), Huntington disease (HD), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
In recent decades, compelling evidence has demonstrated that oligomers are toxic and per se sufficient to induce a pathological cascade involving the cell membrane, mitochondrial damage, and reactive inflammation, finally leading to degeneration of the central nervous system; by contrast, fibrillar large aggregates may be relatively benign.
Many efforts have been made to understand factors leading to proteins’ conformational changes. In some instances, proteins’ instability and increased tendency to polymerize are due to point mutations in the encoding genes, which are responsible for the familial hereditary forms of neurodegenerative diseases. However, the most prevalent cases of typical proteopathies are of unknown origin. In recent years, a lot of studies have focused on lipids, constituting globally about 50% of brain tissue, and on the multidimensional roles that they may have in the pathogenic processes of common neurodegenerative diseases.
It has been shown that lipids can interact particularly with the aggregation and propagation of pathogenic proteins, e.g., amyloid-β, tau, and α-synuclein, underlying the neurodegenerative processes of AD, FTD, PD, and DLB. Moreover, lipids can influence other key aspects of neurodegenerative disease pathophysiology, which are mitochondrial dysfunction, inflammation, and oxidative stress.
This Special Issue on “Lipids in Neurodegenerative Diseases” aims to collect original research and review articles on the multifaceted role that lipids may have on differentiated pathophysiological cascades, leading to the most common as well as to less common neurodegenerative proteopathies.
Prof. Dr. Giuseppe Sancesario
Dr. Valerio Chiurchiù
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- neuron
- astrocytes
- microglia
- neurodegeneration
- protein folding
- Alzheimer’s disease
- Parkinson’s disease
- dementia with Lewy bodies
- amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
- Huntington disease
- Creutzfeldt–Jacob disease
- amyloid precursor protein
- amyloid-β
- tau
- α-synuclein
- oligomers
- fibrils
- lipids
- apolipoproteins
- lipoproteins
- lipoprotein receptors
- blood–brain barrier
- energy metabolism
- oxidative stress
- inflammation
- mitochondria
- myelination
