title: Recombinant Antibody Fragments for Neurodegenerative Diseases.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Recombinant antibody fragments are promising alternatives to full-length immunoglobulins and offer important advantages compared with conventional monoclonal antibodies: extreme specificity, higher affinity, superior stability and solubility, reduced immunogenicity as well as easy and inexpensive large-scale production.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  In this article we will review and discuss recombinant antibodies that are being evaluated for neurodegenerative diseases in pre-clinical models and in clinical studies and will summarize new strategies that are being developed to optimize their stability, specificity and potency for advancing their use.
  
  
  METHODS
  Articles describing recombinant antibody fragments used for neurological diseases were selected (PubMed) and evaluated for their significance.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Different antibody formats such as single-chain fragment variable (scFv), single-domain antibody fragments (VHHs or sdAbs), bispecific antibodies (bsAbs), intrabodies and nanobodies, are currently being studied in pre-clinical models of cancer as well as infectious and autoimmune diseases and many of them are being tested as therapeutics in clinical trials. Immunotherapy approaches have shown therapeutic efficacy in several animal models of Alzheimer´s disease (AD), Parkinson disease (PD), dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), frontotemporal dementia (FTD), Huntington disease (HD), transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) and multiple sclerosis (MS). It has been demonstrated that recombinant antibody fragments may neutralize toxic extra- and intracellular misfolded proteins involved in the pathogenesis of AD, PD, DLB, FTD, HD or TSEs and may target toxic immune cells participating in the pathogenesis of MS.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Recombinant antibody fragments represent a promising tool for the development of antibody-based immunotherapeutics for neurodegenerative diseases.
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Investigaciones Biomedicas, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM), Mexico DF. Mexico.
authors.forename: Karen
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Manoutcharian
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Investigaciones Biomedicas, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM), Mexico DF. Mexico.
authors.forename: Roxanna
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Perez-Garmendia
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Investigaciones Biomedicas, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM), Apartado Postal 70228, Cuidad Universitaria, Mexico DF, CP 04510, Mexico. 0.
authors.forename: Goar
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Gevorkian
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000906:Antibodies / Q000097:blood / Q000627:therapeutic use; D006801:Humans; D007116:Immunization, Passive / Q000379:methods*; D007128:Immunoglobulin Fragments / Q000276:immunology*; D019636:Neurodegenerative Diseases / Q000097:blood / Q000276:immunology / Q000628:therapy; D011994:Recombinant Proteins / Q000276:immunology*
chemical_list: D000906:Antibodies; D007128:Immunoglobulin Fragments; D011994:Recombinant Proteins
keywords: Huntington disease; Recombinant antibody fragments; alzheimer's disease; intrabody; nanobody; parkinson disease; prion protein