title: Association of serum AACT levels and AACT signal polymorphism with late-onset Alzheimer's disease in Northern Ireland.
abstract: alpha1-antichymotrypsin (AACT) is a serine protease inhibitor that has been associated with amyloid plaques in the brains of patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). It has been reported that AACT serum levels are higher in AD patients than in age and sex matched controls. In addition, polymorphisms in the signal peptide and 5' of the AACT gene have been reported to increase the risk of developing AD. Serum AACT has also been suggested to be associated with cognitive decline in elderly subjects. Our objective was to investigate whether a relationship existed between serum AACT levels, AACT genotypes and risk for AD in a case control association study using 108 clinically well defined late onset AD cases and 108 age and sex matched controls from Northern Ireland. We also wished to determine whether higher serum AACT affected levels of cognition as had been previously reported. Serum AACT levels were found to be significantly raised in cases compared to controls (t=3.8, df=209, p<0.001). However, we detected no relationship between serum AACT levels and cognitive decline. We report allelic association of the AACT signal polymorphism with AD (chi(2)=3.70, df=1, p=0.04) but we failed to show any correlation between AACT serum levels and genotype.
authors.affiliation: Department of Geriatric Medicine, The Queen's University of Belfast, Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK. s.mcilroy@qub.ac.uk
authors.forename: S P
authors.initials: SP
authors.lastname: McIlroy
authors.forename: M D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Vahidassr
authors.forename: D A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Savage
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Lloyd
authors.forename: C C
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Patterson
authors.forename: J T
authors.initials: JT
authors.lastname: Lawson
authors.forename: A P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: Passmore
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000483:Alleles; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000097:blood* / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics*; D001057:Apolipoproteins E / Q000235:genetics; D005260:Female; D005838:Genotype; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D009660:Northern Ireland; D011110:Polymorphism, Genetic / Q000235:genetics*; D000514:alpha 1-Antichymotrypsin / Q000097:blood*
chemical_list: D001057:Apolipoproteins E; D000514:alpha 1-Antichymotrypsin