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Elevated Serum α-Synuclein Autoantibodies in Patients with Parkinson’s Disease

Early diagnosis of neurodegenerative diseases is of paramount importance for successful treatment. Lack of sensitive and early biomarkers for diagnosis of diseases like Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a handicapping problem for all movement disorders specialists. Using serum autoimmune antibodies (AIAs) against neural proteins is a new promising strategy to diagnose brain disorders through non-invasive and cost-effective method. In the present study, we measured the level of AIAs against α-synuclein (α-syn), which is an important protein involved in the pathogenesis of PD. In our study patients with PD (46 patients), Alzheimer’s disease (AD) (27 patients) and healthy controls (20 patients) were evaluated according to their sera α-syn AIAs levels. Interestingly, α-syn AIAs were significantly elevated in PD group compared to AD and healthy controls, which advocates their use for diagnosis of PD.

Shalash A, Salama M, Makar M,  Roushdy T, Elrassas HH, MohamedWM, El-Balkimy H, Abou-Donia MB.2017.  Elevated Serum alpha-synuclein autoantibodies in patients with Parkinson’s disease relative to Alzheimer’s disease and controls. Front. Neurol. 8:720| doi: 10.3389.

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Institute of Global Health and Human Ecology, American University in Cairo, Egypt

Dr Mohamed Salama established the first Translational Neuroscience Unit in Egypt. Mohamed’s collaborative research led to establishing the Egyptian Network for Neurodegenerative Disorders (ENND). Mohamed was selected as a SOT Global Senior Scholar in 2013 and Translational/bridging awardee in 2016. He was awarded by Parkinson’s and Movement Disorders Foundation (PMDF) for his continuing research in the field of neurodegeneration.

Recently, Mohamed and his colleagues succeeded to draft the first Reference Egyptian Genome and collaborating with other colleagues to start a national cohort (A Longitudinal Study of Egyptian Health Aging [AL-SEHA]). Currently, Mohamed is Atlantic senior fellow for Equity in brain health at the Global Brain Health Institute (GBHI) and Associate professor at the Institute of Global Health and Human Ecology at the American University in Cairo (AUC).

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