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Cell Death and Diseases of the Nervous System pp 633–647Cite as

Antiglutamate Therapies for Neurodegenerative Disease

The Case of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

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Abstract

Neurodegenerative diseases are a heterogenous group of disorders that are typically adult onset, progressively debilitating, and/or fatal. They are often restricted to the central nervous system (CNS), e.g., Parkinson’s disease, but in some cases can affect multiple organ systems, e.g., ataxia telangectasia. They are typified by selective neural cell degeneration that may affect cells that often share biological or biochemical functions. For example, upper and lower motor neuron degeneration in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), dopaminergic neurons in Parkinson’s disease, cerebellar Purkinje cells and olivary neurons in certain olivopontocerebellar atrophy disorders. In this chapter, the authors will review how the excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate may participate in the cellular degenerative process and discuss therapeutic interventions designed to slow the process. Importantly, glutamate-mediated neurotoxicity may act as either the primary or a secondary toxic agent in these diseases. As will be discussed below, the involvement of glutamate as a secondary event in neurodegeneration may provide a window of therapeutic opportunity to slow neuronal death in these disorders.

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Authors
  1. Osnat Bar-Peled
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  2. Jeffrey D. Rothstein
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Vassilis E. Koliatsos MD

  2. Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Rajiv R. Ratan MD, PhD

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Bar-Peled, O., Rothstein, J.D. (1999). Antiglutamate Therapies for Neurodegenerative Disease. In: Koliatsos, V.E., Ratan, R.R. (eds) Cell Death and Diseases of the Nervous System. Humana Press, Totowa, NJ. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-1602-5_31

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-1602-5_31

  • Publisher Name: Humana Press, Totowa, NJ

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4612-7213-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4612-1602-5

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