Transthyretin as an oxymeter in neurodegenerative diseases
2014
Statens Serum Institut, Copenhagen, Denmark
Transthyretin is an abundant protein in the cerebrospinal fluid and has been found to be prone to oxidation due to changes in the oxidative profile. Several neurodegenerative diseases, like Alzheimer's disease, have oxidative stress as one of their main pathological processes. Thus, characterizing the oxidation profile of transthyretin in the cerebrospinal fluid of patients could be promising. Here, transthyretin isoforms have been profiled in Alzheimer's or mild cognitive impairment patients and controls with an immunoaffinity-mass spectrometry approach. The profile of transthyretin oxidation was correlated to common Alzheimer's biomarkers and diagnostic information. The results show that one specific transthyretin modification was found to be elevated in the cerebrospinal fluid of dementia patients, but no correlations were found with common biomarkers. Also, it was difficult to manipulate transthyretin ex vivo and further investigation is needed to improve the handling of cerebrospinal fluid samples. In conclusion, researchers could find some clues that point to the transthyretin oxidation profile as a potential biomarker to monitor the onset and evolution of neurodegenerative diseases that involve oxidative stress, but further studies need to be done to confirm these results.
Distinct transthyretin oxidation isoform profile in spinal fluid from patients with Alzheimer’s disease and mild cognitive impairment
Niels H H Heegaard
Added on: 08-29-2021
[1] https://clinicalproteomicsjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1559-0275-11-12[2] https://data.jrc.ec.europa.eu/dataset/a8fd26ef-b113-47ab-92ba-fd2be449c7eb
