Endpoints: Critical Preclinical Markers in Neurodegeneration Disease Assays

Altered dopaminergic neurotransmission underlies a variety of neurological and neuropsychiatric diseases, including playing a central role in the neurodegenerative processes that lead to Parkinson’s disease. Loss of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra within the brain disrupts motor control pathways resulting in the development and progression of symptoms such as bradykinesia, rigidity, and tremors.

The degeneration of dopamine neurons is believed to result from neuronal dysregulation and cell death subsequent to oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction related to lysosomal accumulation of a toxic form of alpha-synuclein. Understanding the complex interplay between alteration of dopamine signaling and neurodegeneration is crucial for developing targeted therapeutic strategies that preserve dopaminergic function to address Parkinsonian symptoms and ultimately identify appropriate neuronal pathways that may mitigate dopamine neuronal loss and disease progression.

In this GEN webinar, our speaker John Renger, PhD, chief scientific officer at Cerevel Therapeutics, discusses preclinical markers used in assays relevant to neurodegenerative disease processes, including the evaluation of autophagy and mitophagy using methods such as immunohistochemistry, western blotting, ELISA-like assays, high content analysis, and other platforms. You’ll gain insight into how these assays are able to yield important insights into disease progression models of neurodegeneration and reveal the potential of novel targets for new treatments to slow or stop progression of debilitating neurodegenerative disease.

A live Q&A session followed the presentation, offering a chance to pose questions to our expert panelist.