Passive Immunization Reduces Behavioral and Neuropathological Deficits in an Alpha-Synuclein Transgenic Model of Lewy Body Disease

Authors

Troy Rohn, Boise State UniversityFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

4-29-2011

DOI

http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0019338

Abstract

Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) and Parkinson's Disease (PD) are common causes of motor and cognitive deficits and are associated with the abnormal accumulation of alpha-synuclein (α-syn). This study investigated whether passive immunization with a novel monoclonal α-syn antibody (9E4) against the C-terminus (CT) of α-syn was able to cross into the CNS and ameliorate the deficits associated with α-syn accumulation. In this study we demonstrate that 9E4 was effective at reducing behavioral deficits in the water maze, moreover, immunization with 9E4 reduced the accumulation of calpain-cleaved α-syn in axons and synapses and the associated neurodegenerative deficits. In vivo studies demonstrated that 9E4 traffics into the CNS, binds to cells that display α-syn accumulation and promotes α-syn clearance via the lysosomal pathway. These results suggest that passive immunization with monoclonal antibodies against the CT of α-syn may be of therapeutic relevance in patients with PD and DLB.

Copyright Statement

This document was originally published by PLOS ONE in PLOS ONE. This work is provided under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 license. Details regarding the use of this work can be found at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/legalcode. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0019338

For full list of authors, please see article.

Publication Information

Rohn, Troy. (2011). "Passive Immunization Reduces Behavioral and Neuropathological Deficits in an Alpha-Synuclein Transgenic Model of Lewy Body Disease". PLOS ONE, 6(4), .