Faithin Omaha eBook Collection

Download or read book Regulation of Amyloid-beta Protein Levels by Proteolytic Degradation and Its Implications for Alzheimer's Disease written by Matthew Louis Hemming and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 558 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Accumulation and deposition of the amyloid beta-protein (A[beta]) is an invariant feature of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Biochemical, cell biological, animal modeling, genetic, and emerging clinical data all suggest that A[beta] is an upstream initiator of the disease process and its neuropathology. Decreasing brain A[beta] is an emerging therapeutic approach for AD, and currently efforts are being made to block A[beta] production or enhance its clearance through vaccination. A less well understood mechanism of A[beta] clearance is enzymatic degradation by proteases within the brain. The purpose of this thesis is to describe pathways of A[beta] catabolism that may shed light on disease pathogenesis. Further, such insight may prove useful for assessing disease risk as well as offering preventative and therapeutic measures against the disease. I first present evidence that an enzyme genetically associated with AD, the angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE), is an A[beta]-degrading protease. I determine that ACE is expressed within the brain, and that cellular overexpression of ACE promotes the degradation of A[beta].