title: Histone-acetylation: a link between Alzheimer's disease and post-traumatic stress disorder?
abstract: The orchestration of gene-expression programs is essential for cellular homeostasis. Epigenetic processes provide to the cell a key mechanism that allows the regulation of gene-expression networks in response to environmental stimuli. Recently epigenetic mechanisms such as histone-modifications have been implicated with cognitive function and altered epigenome plasticity has been linked to the pathogenesis of neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric diseases. Thus, key regulators of epigenetic gene-expression have emerged as novel drug targets for brain diseases. Numerous recent review articles discuss in detail the current findings of epigenetic processes in brain diseases. The aim of this article is not to give yet another comprehensive overview of the field but to specifically address the question why the same epigenetic therapies that target histone-acetylation may be suitable to treat seemingly different diseases such as Alzheimer's disease and post-traumatic stress disorder.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center Göttingen Göttingen, Germany ; Research Group for Epigenetics in Neurodegenerative Diseases, German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) Göttingen Germany.
authors.forename: Sanaz
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bahari-Javan
authors.affiliation: Research Group for Epigenetics in Neurodegenerative Diseases, German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) Göttingen Germany.
authors.forename: Farahnaz
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Sananbenesi
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center Göttingen Göttingen, Germany ; Research Group for Epigenetics in Neurodegenerative Diseases, German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) Göttingen Germany.
authors.forename: Andre
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fischer
keywords: Alzheimer's disease (AD); HDAC inhibitors (HDACi); Histone-deacetylases (HDACs); epigenetic gene-expression; post-traumatic stress disorder (PTST)