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Phospholipids pp 205–211Cite as

Biological Markers of Alzheimer’s Disease: A View from the Perspective of Phospholipids in Membrane Function

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Abstract

Considerable variability exists in the clinical expression of Alzheimer’s disease, yet the biological underpinnings of this variability are not well understood. Significant differences in clinical presentation include both global characteristics such as age at onset and rate of progression of dementia (39,40,60), as well as the manifestation of selective cognitive deficits (4,6,11,63), neurological symptoms (21,31), and behavioral syndromes (27,33,38,66). Of these, age at onset of dementia may be the clinical characteristic that has received the most attention. While Alzheimer’s disease appears to have a typical onset between 75 and 85 years (26,34,64), a subpopulation of patients who meet clinical consensus and neuropathological criteria for this disorder develop dementia several decades earlier. Age at onset of dementia appears to be a familial characteristic that is influenced by at least two genes, FAD (47) and PMF (7). However, twin studies indicate that this variable is also affected by stochastic processes or unidentified environmental factors (61). Furthermore, an early onset of Alzheimer’s disease is associated with more global distributions of brain morphologic lesions and neurochemical deficits than are the more typical later-onset cases (39,40,67).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, 3811 O’Hara Street, Room E-1230, Pittsburgh, PA, 15213, USA

    George S. Zubenko

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  1. George S. Zubenko
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  1. Stritch School of Medicine, Loyola University of Chicago, Maywood, Illinois, USA

    Israel Hanin

  2. University of Florence, Florence, Italy

    Giancarlo Pepeu

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Zubenko, G.S. (1990). Biological Markers of Alzheimer’s Disease: A View from the Perspective of Phospholipids in Membrane Function. In: Hanin, I., Pepeu, G. (eds) Phospholipids. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4757-1364-0_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4757-1364-0_16

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