163 1784 3 PB

Artigo

Doença de Alzheimer: Caracterização, Evolução e Implicações do Processo
Neuroinflamatório
Viegas, F. P. D.; Simões, M. C. R.; Rocha, M. D.; Castelli, M. R.; Moreira, M. S.; Viegas
Junior, C. *
Rev. Virtual Quim., 2011, 3 (4), 286-306. Data de publicação na Web: 20 de outubro de 2011 http://www.uff.br/rvq Alzheimer’s Disease: Characterization,
Neuroinflammatory Process

Evolution

and

Implications

of

the

Abstract: Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease characterized by a progressive memory loss and severe cognition decline, associated to degradation of cholinergic neurons in many areas of central nervous system (CNS), with a dramatic reduction in neurotransmitters, specially acetylcholine. The illness progression is also accompanied by behavior changes, leading to individual incapacity and depression, and evolving to dementia and death. AD is related to cerebral aging and located loss of neurons, mainly at hippocampus and basal pro-encephalic tissue. Pathohystologically, AD is characterized by extracellular deposits of senile plaques formed by insoluble fragments of amyloid protein precursor (A) and intracellular neurofibrillary tangles in the brain, constituted by fragments of hyperphosphorylated TAU protein, with a massive loss in neurons. Despite typical behavior aspects of AD installation, recent studies, especially from the last decade, have evidenced the occurrence of a complex inflammatory process in the neuronal tissue. The relevancy of neuroinflammation in the installation, progression and severity of AD, as well as the mechanisms of immune system activation and key cells in the initial shot of inflammatory cascade in CNS, as microglia and astrocytes, have been demonstrated by important reviews in the literature. Activation of microglia can lead to recruitment of astrocytes that increase the inflammatory response to the extracellular A deposits. This neuroinflammatory component of AD is additionally characterized by a local