thesis
Mechanisms of Neuronal Death in a Transgenic Mouse Model for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis
- Publication date
- 27 April 2005
- Publisher
- Neurons are large post-mitotic cells with a high metabolic activity and a highly
complex morphology characterized by a dendritic tree that consists of a network of
processes, and an axon that can have length of up to 104 times the diameter of the
cell body. Because of this complexity the maintenance of the functional and
structural integrity of neurons throughout life is a complex task that requires
sophisticated transport, damage control and repair machineries. Hence, it is not
surprising that aging is associated with structural and functional deterioration of the
central nervous system and that neurodegenerative diseases (diseases that cause
the premature loss of neurons) are among the dominant disorders associated with
aging. The knowledge on processes involved in normal aging and neuronal death
in neurodegerative diseases is increasing, but far from complete. Intervention in
these processes is therefore not yet possible.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a fatal disease in which motoneurons in the
spinal cord, brain stem and motor cortex degenerate. This disease has an
incidence of 2-3 per 100.000 people, meaning that 300-450 people are diagnosed
with the disease each year. The survival of ALS-patients is on average 3 years
after diagnosis. The first symptoms are usually fatigue, muscle cramps, and
weakness in the muscles of one of the limbs, progressing to paralysis and
spreading to other parts of the body, eventually causing total body paralysis. In
most patients (about 90%) no apparent genetic cause for their disease has been
found, in those cases the disease is called sporadic ALS. In the other 10% a
hereditary pattern has been found; familial ALS. In 1993 a mutation was found in
the gene for superoxide dismutase 1 (SOD1) which causes ALS in some familial
ALS families. By now more than 110 different mutations in the SOD1-gene have
been linked to familial ALS and more recently mutations in 5 other genes have
been found to cause familial ALS.
The discovery of SOD1-mutations has enabled the production of transgenic
mutant-SOD1 expressing mice that develop an ALS-like motoneuron disease.
These SOD1-mutant mice develop a disease strongly resembling human ALS.
These transgenic mice offer the possibility to study all stages of motoneuron death.
In this thesis different aspects of ALS in the transgenic mouse model and in
cultured motoneurons are studied and discussed.