Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the major subtype of dementia and the most common progressive neurodegenerative disease in which the central nervous system cells stop working or die. Neuroinflammation is one of the pathogenic factors in AD which has to be solved in order to alleviate symptoms. Unfortunately, few neuroinflammation-targeting molecules displayed convincing enough effects to support their usage in clinical treatment. Therefore, the discovery of novel molecules with definitive efficacy in neuroinflammation may provide a glimmer of hope for AD management.
Researchers from the Guangxi University of Chinese Medicine assessed the expression of micro RNA miR-212-3p, a small single-stranded non-coding RNA molecule, in AD rats and rat hippocampal neuronal cells, as well as its role in neurological functions, neuroinflammation and programmed death of neurons. Their findings suggested that miR-212-3p was poorly expressed in brain tissues of AD rats, and that miR-212-3p overexpression reduced all three of the said processes.
The study demonstrated that miR-212-3p plays a protective role in the neuroinflammation of AD rats and that it might be a potential target in AD treatment. However, since the study itself was limited to rat and cell models, it is important to validate the relevance of this micro RNA in AD human-derived cell models and clinical patients.
阿爾茨海默病 (AD) 是癡呆症的主要亞型，也是最常見的進行性神經退行性疾病，其中中樞神經系統細胞停止工作或死亡。神經炎症是AD的致病因素之一，必須解決才能緩解症狀。不幸的是，很少有神經炎症靶向分子顯示出足夠令人信服的效果來支持它們在臨床治療中的使用。因此，發現在神經炎症中具有明確療效的新分子可能為 AD 管理提供一線希望。
廣西中醫藥大學的研究人員評估了 micro RNA miR-212-3p（一種小的單鏈非編碼 RNA 分子）在 AD 大鼠和大鼠海馬神經元細胞中的表達，以及其在神經功能、神經炎症中的作用和神經元的程序性死亡。他們的研究結果表明 miR-212-3p 在 AD 大鼠的腦組織中表達不佳，並且 miR-212-3p 過表達減少了所有三個上述過程。
該研究表明，miR-212-3p 在 AD 大鼠的神經炎症中起保護作用，可能是 AD 治療的潛在靶點。然而，由於該研究本身僅限於大鼠和細胞模型，因此驗證這種微 RNA 在 AD 人源細胞模型和臨床患者中的相關性非常重要。
Reference: Nong W, Bao C, Chen Y, Wei Z. miR-212-3p attenuates neuroinflammation of rats with Alzheimer’s disease via regulating the SP1/BACE1/NLRP3/Caspase-1 signaling pathway. Bosn J of Basic Med Sci [Internet]. 2022Feb.12 [cited 2022Feb.20];. Available from: https://www.bjbms.org/ojs/index.php/bjbms/article/view/6723.
Editor: Merima Bukva, MPharm
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