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Updated: Jul 3, 2026
In Vitro Aggregation Assays Using Hyperphosphorylated Tau Protein
Published on: January 2, 2015
Reduction of Phosphorylated Tau in Alzheimer's Disease Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Neuro-Spheroids by
Elisa Giunti1,2, Roberto Collu1,2, Sarah Daley1,2
1Geriatric Research Education and Clinical Center, Bedford VA Healthcare System, Bedford, MA, USA.
Background:
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most predominant form of dementia. Rho-associated coiled coil kinase (ROCK) inhibitor, fasudil, is one of the candidate drugs against the AD progression.
Objective:
We aimed to investigate possible changes of AD associated markers in three-dimensional neuro-spheroids (3D neuro-spheroids) generated from induced pluripotent stem cells derived from AD patients or healthy control subjects (HC) and to determine the impact of pharmacological intervention with the ROCK inhibitor fasudil.
Methods:
We treated 3D neuro-spheroids with fasudil and tested the possible effect on AD markers by ELISA, transcriptomic and proteomic analyses.
Results:
Transcriptomic analysis revealed a reduction in the expression of AKT serine/threonine-protein kinase 1 (AKT1) in AD neuro-spheroids, compared to HC. This decrease was reverted in the presence of fasudil. Proteomic analysis showed up- and down-regulation of proteins related to AKT pathway in fasudil-treated neuro-spheroids. We found an evident increase of phosphorylated tau at four different residues (pTau181, 202, 231, and 396) in AD compared to HC-derived neuro-spheroids. This was accompanied by a decrease of secreted clusterin (clu) and an increase of intracellular clu levels in AD patient-derived neuro-spheroids. Increases of phosphorylated tau in AD patient-derived neuro-spheroids were suppressed in the presence of fasudil.
Conclusions:
Fasudil modulates clu protein levels and enhances AKT1 that results in the suppression of AD associated tau phosphorylation.
