Neuroscience letters
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Neuroscience letters · Jul 2015
Detection of α-synuclein oligomers in red blood cells as a potential biomarker of Parkinson's disease.
Parkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by intracellular α-synuclein (α-syn) deposition. Alterations in α-syn levels in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and plasma of PD patients have been thought to be potential PD biomarkers; however, contamination arising from hemolysis often influences the accuracy of detecting α-syn levels in the CSF and plasma. In this study, α-syn oligomer levels in red blood cells (RBCs) obtained from 100 PD patients, 22 MSA patients, and 102 control subjects were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. ⋯ The ratio of RBC α-syn oligomer/total protein was also higher in MSA patients than in controls (22.9±13.9 ng/mg vs. 15.4±7.4 ng/mg, P<0.001). However, no significant difference was found for α-syn oligomer/total protein ratio between PD and MSA (29.0±19.8 ng/mg vs. 22.9±13.9 ng/mg, P>0.05). The present results suggest that the RBC α-syn oligomer/total protein ratio can be a potential diagnostic biomarker for PD.