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Updated: Aug 20, 2025

An Alternative Approach to Study Primary Events in Neurodegeneration Using Ex Vivo Rat Brain Slices
Published on: April 11, 2018
Pathophysiology of Alzheimer's Disease
Brandon C Yarns1, Kelsey A Holiday2, David M Carlson1
1Psychiatry/Mental Health Service, VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System, 11301 Wilshire Boulevard, Building 401, Mail Code 116AE, Los Angeles, CA 90073, USA; Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, 757 Westwood Plaza #4, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
Abstract:
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most common neurodegenerative disease leading to dementia worldwide. While neuritic plaques consisting of aggregated amyloid-beta proteins and neurofibrillary tangles of accumulated tau proteins represent the pathophysiologic hallmarks of AD, numerous processes likely interact with risk and protective factors and one's culture to produce the cognitive loss, neuropsychiatric symptoms, and functional impairments that characterize AD dementia. Recent biomarker and neuroimaging research has revealed how the pathophysiology of AD may lead to symptoms, and as the pathophysiology of AD gains clarity, more potential treatments are emerging that aim to modify the disease and relieve its burden.
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