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Updated: May 14, 2026

Detection of Disease-associated α-synuclein by Enhanced ELISA in the Brain of Transgenic Mice Overexpressing Human A53T Mutated α-synuclein
Published on: May 30, 2015
Enteric alpha-synuclein expression is increased in Parkinson's disease but not Alzheimer's disease
Andrea Gold1, Zorbey T Turkalp, David G Munoz
1Laboratory Medicine, St. Michael's Hospital, University of Toronto & Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Background And Objective:
Alpha-synuclein (α-Syn) is immunohistochemically detectable in enteric neurons in some subjects. We determined its age distribution in the general autopsy population and in an age-matched subset investigated differences with Parkinson's (PD) and Alzheimer's diseases (AD).
Methods:
Archival autopsy samples of colon from 95 cases (77 general population, 10 PD, and 8 AD) were immunostained with monoclonal antibody KM51. α-Syn detectability was semiquantitatively graded 1 to 3.
Results:
α-Syn was detectable in 52% of the general population, and its level of expression did not change between ages 40 and 91. All PD subjects were α-Syn positive, with higher prevalence (P = 0.001) and grade (P = 0.003) than age-matched controls. AD subjects were no more likely to be α-Syn positive or have a higher grade than controls.
Conclusions:
Either PD develops selectively in the enterically α-Syn-positive population subset or PD induces this expression. Absence of increased α-Syn expression in AD points to differences in pathogenesis.
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