Establishment of experimental models for Alzheimer's disease research

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a severe neurodegenerative disease in brain. It leads to a progressive and irreversible decline in memory and cognition. There is no curing method for AD now. AD patients will eventually die. The typical neuropathological changes of AD brain include extracellular senile plaques (deposition of beta-amyloid) and intracellular neurofibrillary tangles. It is predicted that 1 in 85 people in the world will be diagnosed as AD in 2050. In AD research, experimental models are very important. In the past decades, many experimental models of AD were established. In this review, the experimental models that commonly used in AD research are concisely summarized. These models make great contributions to AD research. However, they do have their limitations due to incomplete reflection of AD pathology. Therefore, new experimental models of AD are needed to be established in the future.