Effect of acetylcholine on tau phosphorylation in human neuroblastoma cells

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a senile dementia characterized by a progressive loss of memory, together with cognitive and behavioral impairments. In the past it was indicated that the disease was associated with a loss of acetylcholine (ACh) in the cerebral cortex (Bowen et al., 1976; Davies and Maloney, 1976); afterward, it was indicated that the severity of dementia was correlated with the extent of cholinergic loss (Perry et al., 1981). Because one of the biochemical features of AD is modification by phosphorylation of the microtubule-associated protein tau (for review, see Avila et al., 2004), in this work we indicate the effect of ACh on tau phosphorylation at specific sites recognized by 12E8 and PThr50 antibodies in human neuroblastoma SH-SY5Y cells. Two sites in which modification might regulate the binding of tau to microtubules (Novak et al., 1991; Feijoo et al., 2004).