The galvanization of β-amyloid in Alzheimer's disease

摘要

Whereas a decade ago thoughts of metals and Alzheimer's disease (AD) conjured up thoughts of tossing out your aluminum cookware, more recently, zinc, copper, and iron have been impli- cated in AD pathology. These metals are not derived from your saucepan or de- odorant, but are already resident in the brain. Zinc is not a trace metal in the brain. In fact, zinc, copper, and iron con- centrations in gray matter are in the same order of magnitude as magnesium (0.1- 0.5 mM; refs. 1 and 2) and their partici- pation in major neu- rological diseases is being increasingly appreciated (3).