Staff and specialities

Associate Professor: Masaki NISHIMURA
   Neurology

Outline of the department

The aim of this laboratory is to elucidate the molecular mechanisms underlying 
neurodegenerative diseases. Especially we are focusing on Alzheimer's 
disease (AD), a major and devastating disorder causing senile dementia. 
Long species of β-amyloid peptides (Aβ) have been considered to play a 
central role in the pathogenesis of AD. Presenilins encoded by causative 
genes for familial form of AD are involved in γ-secretase cleavage of 
β-amyloid precursor protein leading to the generation of Aβ. Pathological 
mutations of prsenilins specifically increase the generation of long species 
of Aβ' althogh the exact function and mutational effect of presenilins remain 
elusive.

Our on-going studies are addressing the following issues:
1) The physiological function of presenilins on Aβ generation. 
2) The molecular mechanism by which the pathological mutations of 
   presenilins cause the selective increase of long Aβ. 
3) The regulation mechanism of γ-secretase activation.