title: Plasma alpha-synuclein in patients with Parkinson's disease with and without treatment.
abstract: Alpha-synuclein (alpha-syn) is an intracellular protein with a high tendency to aggregation. It is the major component of Lewy bodies and may play a key role in the pathogenesis of Parkinson's disease (PD). alpha-Syn is also released by neurons and can be detected in biological fluids, such as plasma. The purpose of this study was to determine whether plasma alpha-syn concentrations are elevated in newly diagnosed PD patients before treatment (nontreated PD group, ntPD; n = 53) and to compare them with concentrations in PD patients with at least 1 year of specific treatment (tPD; n = 42) and in healthy controls (n = 60). Plasma alpha-syn concentrations in the ntPD and tPD groups were similar and significantly higher than in healthy controls. In conclusion, alpha-syn was elevated early in the development of PD and specific PD treatment did not change plasma alpha-syn levels.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology and Institute of Neurosciences, Centro de Investigaciones Biomedicas (CIBM), University of Granada, Granada, Spain.
authors.forename: Raquel
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Duran
authors.forename: Francisco J
authors.initials: FJ
authors.lastname: Barrero
authors.forename: Blas
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Morales
authors.forename: Juan D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Luna
authors.forename: Manuel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ramirez
authors.forename: Francisco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Vives
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000978:Antiparkinson Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D004358:Drug Therapy / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007980:Levodopa / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010300:Parkinson Disease / Q000097:blood / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000453:epidemiology; D051844:alpha-Synuclein / Q000097:blood*
chemical_list: D000978:Antiparkinson Agents; D051844:alpha-Synuclein; D007980:Levodopa