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Biomedical subjects

K Iqbal

Publications and source records attributed to K Iqbal.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Tau and ubiquitin in the human hypothalamus in aging and Alzheimer's disease.

Immunocytochemical staining of hypothalamic cell groups with four antibodies to Alzheimer paired helical filaments (PHF) (i.e., anti-PHF serum 60e and monoclonal antibody (mAb) Alz-50, both directed against normal and abnormally phosphorylated tau; mAb tau-1, which recognizes tau; and mAb 3-39 to PHF, which recognizes the carboxy terminal domain of ubiquitin) revealed a clear distinction between 12 Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients and seven controls in the hypothalamus. Dystrophic neurites, which appeared to be the most specific components in AD, were most conspicuous after Alz-50 staining. However, Alz-50 also stained neuronal cytoplasm and normal, thin, beaded neurites in the paraventricular nucleus (PVN) of controls, even of young cases. This staining was clearly distinct from the staining of cytoplasm and dystrophic neurites in the PVN of Alzheimer patients. The abundant staining of dystrophic neurites and cell bodies in the nucleus tuberalis lateralis (NTL) in AD, in which no neuronal loss is observed, suggests that alterations in cytoskeletal markers do not necessarily indicate impending cell death. Moreover, the cytoskeletal changes in the NTL, sexually dimorphic and suprachiasmatic nuclei in AD indicate that this condition is not restricted to cortical areas or nuclei projecting to the cortex. Consequently, the pathophysiological implications of cytoskeletal staining in AD are at present far from clear. The human hypothalamus may not only provide a better insight into the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease, but could also be of help in the neuropathological diagnosis of this condition.

Aged

Effect of buffer constituents on the determination of therapeutic proteins by capillary electrophoresis.

Capillary electrophoresis has proved to be a versatile method for the determination of proteins, peptides and amino acids in pharmaceutical formulations. For quantification of the capillary electrophoresis data, however, significant errors may result if the analysis is performed using improper separation conditions. The peak area response for protein analytes, which is generally low in conventional UV detection, may also vary dramatically depending on the nature of the buffer used in the separation. This paper describes the effects of various buffer constituents and analytical conditions on the capillary electrophoretic separation and quantification of a humanized monoclonal antibody in bulk form and in a typical therapeutic formulation. For optimum peak area response and reproducibility, protein derivatization with an appropriate chromophore (e.g., fluorescamine) and separation in the presence of a moderate ionic strength buffer containing lithium chloride, tetramethylammonium chloride or trimethylammonium propylsulfonate is recommended. General guidelines for the determination of proteins by capillary electrophoresis and a rationale for the use of internal standards to improve the quantification of data are also discussed.

Antibodies, Monoclonal

Assay of protein drug substances present in solution mixtures by fluorescamine derivatization and capillary electrophoresis.

A method is described to enhance the resolution and detection sensitivity of proteins, peptides, and amino acids in capillary electrophoretic analysis of solution mixtures. The method consists of derivatizing the analytes with fluorescamine, which is normally used as a fluorogenic reagent for compounds containing a reactive primary amine functional group, and then using the derivative as an ultraviolet chromophore to enhance detection sensitivity (measured at 280 nm) in capillary electrophoresis. The results demonstrated a significant improvement in the separation and detection sensitivity of the derivatized analytes as compared to their underivatized counterparts. The use of chromophores, such as fluorescamine, in capillary electrophoresis facilitates the analysis of components of solution mixtures, such as pharmaceutical formulations, that could not be resolved and/or detected by conventional capillary electrophoresis procedures.

Antibodies, Monoclonal

Detection of point mutations in codon 331 of mitochondrial NADH dehydrogenase subunit 2 in Alzheimer's brains.

Point mutations in codon 331 of mitochondrial NADH dehydrogenase subunit 2 (ND2) were detected in 10 of 19 Alzheimer's brains but not in 11 normal brains. The same mutations were also detected in 2 of 6 patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). However, neurofibrillary tangles and neuritic plaques characteristic of Alzheimer's disease were found histologically in the brain of one ALS patient who was positive of the mutation. The finding suggests that a point mutation in ND2 is a potential risk factor for Alzheimer's disease.

Adult

Effect of iontophoresis on in vitro skin permeation of an analogue of growth hormone releasing factor in the hairless guinea pig model.

The shortened analogue of growth hormone releasing factor (GRF) Ro 23-7861 (1) has a molecular weight of 3929 daltons [equivalent to GRF (1-29)] and is more potent than the endogenous GRF (1-44). The in vitro hairless guinea pig model and vertical and horizontal diffusion cell assemblies were used to study the effect of iontophoresis on the permeability to skin of 1. The transport of 1 across the skin was studied by monitoring the rate of its appearance in the receiver compartment with a radioimmunoassay. No permeability of 1 was observed without iontophoresis, whereas with iontophoresis, the permeability of 1 was significant. For example, at a current density of 0.23 mA/cm2 and buffer concentration of 0.05 M, the flux of 1 was 56.8 +/- 8.21 ng/cm2.h. The flux of 1 was independent of the design of the permeation apparatus, the electrodes, the donor and receiver volumes, the type of current (constant or pulsed), and the frequency of the pulsed current. The flux of 1 increased curvilinearly with the increase in salt concentration of the buffer and linearly with the increase in current.

Algorithms

Nasal delivery of [14C]dextromethorphan hydrochloride in rats: levels in plasma and brain.

Dextromethorphan (DM) is a neuroprotective agent. The mechanism of action is believed to be by N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor blockade. The concentration of DM in the brain is believed to be dose and route dependent. Delivery by the nasal route has received a lot of attention recently, because drug absorption from this route follows intravenous profiles with no first-pass effect. The uptake of DM in the brain from the nasal route was 65.9% compared with the intravenous route, whereas the plasma bioavailability from the nasal route was 78.8%. The nasal route is a viable alternative to the parenteral route for DM administration.

Absorption

Ultrastructure of the microglia that phagocytose amyloid and the microglia that produce beta-amyloid fibrils.

The function of microglia associated with beta-amyloid deposits still remains a controversial issue. On the basis of recent ultrastructural data, microglia were postulated to be cells that form amyloid fibrils, not phagocytes that remove amyloid deposits. In this electron microscopic study, we examined the ability of microglia to ingest and digest exogenous amyloid fibrils in vitro. We demonstrate that amyloid fibrils are ingested by cultured microglial cells and collected and stored in phagosomes. The ingested, nondegraded amyloid remains within phagosomes for up to 20 days, suggesting a very limited effectiveness of microglia in degrading beta-amyloid fibrils. On the other hand, we showed that in microglial cells of classical plaques in brain cortex of patients with Alzheimer's disease, amyloid fibrils appear first in altered endoplasmic reticulum and deep infoldings of cell membranes. These differences in intracellular distribution of amyloid fibrils in microglial cells support our observations that microglial cells associated with amyloid plaques are engaged in production of amyloid, but not in phagocytosis.

Amyloid

Brain levels of microtubule-associated protein tau are elevated in Alzheimer's disease: a radioimmuno-slot-blot assay for nanograms of the protein.

The microtubule-associated protein tau, which stimulates the assembly of alpha-beta tubulin heterodimers into microtubules, is abnormally phosphorylated in Alzheimer's disease (AD) brain and is the major component of paired helical filaments. In the present study, the levels of tau and abnormally phosphorylated tau were determined in brain homogenates of AD and age-matched control cases. A radioimmuno-slot-blot assay was developed, using a primary monoclonal antibody, Tau-1, and a secondary antibody, antimouse 125I-immunoglobulin G. To assay the abnormally phosphorylated tau, the blots were treated with alkaline phosphatase before immunolabeling. The levels of total tau were about eightfold higher in AD (7.3 +/- 2.7 ng/micrograms of protein) than in control cases (0.9 +/- 0.2 ng/micrograms), and this increase was in the form of the abnormally phosphorylated protein. These studies indicate that the abnormal phosphorylation--not a decrease in the level of tau--is a likely cause of neurofibrillary degeneration in AD.

Aged

Immune electron microscopic characterization of monoclonal antibodies to Alzheimer neurofibrillary tangles.

Characterization of eleven monoclonal antibodies (MAbs), raised to isolated sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS)-treated Alzheimer's neurofibrillary tangles (ANT), has revealed the presence of at least two different epitopes. MAbs were tested for reactivity to ubiquitin and paired helical filaments (PHF) isolated by three different procedures. The effect of protease and/or alkaline phosphatase pretreatment on the reactivity of the MAbs with isolated PHF was also examined. All MAbs that had reacted strongly in the ELISA with sonicated SDS-treated ANT also immune decorated isolated PHF to varying degrees. Two MAbs exhibited a high reactivity to PHF: 3-39 and 5-25. MAb 3-39 was found to recognize a protease sensitive epitope. In contrast MAb 5-25 was found to consistently decorate isolated PHF in all preparations and exhibited a strong reactivity to ubiquitin, and the epitope in isolated PHF was not protease sensitive. Thus structural PHF after protease treatment and detergent treatment contain an antigenic site that is present in ubiquitin.

Alzheimer Disease

Measurement of picomoles of phosphoamino acids by high-performance liquid chromatography.

A reverse-phase, high-performance liquid chromatographic system (HPLC) is described that makes possible optimal resolution and quantitation of picomole levels of phosphoamino acids, both with or without the presence of a large excess of nonphosphorylated amino acids. The assay involves precolumn derivatization of an amino acid mixture with phenyl isothiocyanate (PITC) at room temperature, followed by separation of phosphoamino acids from other amino acids by HPLC. The liquid chromatography was carried out on a C18 reverse-phase column at pH 7.4 and 30 degrees C using gradient elution with eluent A as 157 mM sodium acetate containing 2% acetonitrile and eluent B as 60% acetonitrile in water. A uv absorption at 254 nm is employed for detection of the PITC-derivatized amino acids eluting from the column. Amino acids are eluted with baseline resolution in the following order: phosphoserine, phosphothreonine, aspartic acid, glutamic acid, and phosphotyrosine followed by other amino acids. The sensitivity is in the picomole range, and the separation time, injection to injection, is 36 min. Phosphoserine, phosphothreonine, and phosphotyrosine are resolved within the first 8 min. This procedure enables determination of as low as 5 pmol of nonradioactive phosphoamino acids in a 100-fold excess of amino acids, as is usually present in most phosphoproteins in the natural state. Phosphoamino acids in polypeptides separated by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide electrophoresis and transferred to polyvinylidene difluoride (PVDF) membrane, or protein samples directly blotted on the membrane, can also be analyzed by this procedure after acid hydrolysis of the proteins bound to the PVDF membrane.

Amino Acids

Alzheimer's disease: paired helical filament immunoreactivity in cerebrospinal fluid.

A competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay with high sensitivity has been developed for measuring ubiquitin reactivity of paired helical filaments (PHF). Using the assay, ubiquitin immunoreactivity was estimated in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of 44 patients who had been clinically diagnosed as having Alzheimer's disease (AD) and of 38 control patients, including 20 neurological cases. Monoclonal antibody (mAb) 5-25 to isolated paired helical filaments was used. This mAb recognizes amino acids 64-76 of ubiquitin. The levels of ubiquitin immunoreactivity measured in CSF (twice diluted) were significantly higher in the AD (p less than 0.001) than in the control group. In only a minority of instances were values for ubiquitin levels the same in AD and control groups: on PHF-coated plates, immunoreactivity values for 77% of the AD CSF specimens were higher than those for 92% of the controls, and on ubiquitin-coated plates, values for 85% of the AD CSF specimens were higher than those for 88% of the controls. On immunoblots of both AD and control CSF, mAb 5-25 stained a series of protein bands. The free ubiquitin that is also present in the CSF was not labeled. No striking differences were detected in the immunoblot pattern of AD and control CSF. This study demonstrates the presence of quantitative differences in the conjugated ubiquitin in AD and control CSF.

Adult

Ubiquitination and abnormal phosphorylation of paired helical filaments in Alzheimer's disease.

The most characteristic cellular change in Alzheimer's disease is the accumulation of aberrant filaments, the paired helical filaments (PHF), in the affected neurons. There is growing evidence from a number of laboratories that dementia correlates better with the accumulation of PHF than of the extracellular amyloid, the second major lesion of Alzheimer's disease. PHF are both morphologically and biochemically unlike any of the normal neurofibrils. The major polypeptides in isolated PHF are microtubule-associated protein tau. Tau in PHF is phosphorylated differently from tau in microtubules. This abnormal phosphorylation of tau in PHF occurs at several sites. The accumulation of abnormally phosphorylated tau in the affected neurons in Alzheimer's disease brain precedes both the formation and the ubiquitination of the neurofibrillary tangles. In Alzheimer's disease brain, tubulin is assembly competent, but the in vitro assembly of microtubules is not observed. In vitro, the phosphate groups in PHF are less accessible than those of tau to alkaline phosphatase. The in vitro dephosphorylated PHF polypeptides stimulate microtubule assembly from bovine tubulin. It is hypothesized that a defect in the protein phosphorylation/dephosphorylation system is one of the earliest events in the cytoskeletal pathology in Alzheimer's disease. Production of nonfunctional tau by its phosphorylation and its polymerization into PHF most probably contributes to a microtubule assembly defect, and consequently, to a compromise in both axoplasmic flow and neuronal function. Index Entries: Alzheimer's disease; mechanisms of neuronal degeneration; neurofibrillary changes; paired helical filaments: biochemistry; microtubule-associated protein tau; abnormal phosphorylation; ubiquitination; microtubule assembly; axoplasmic flow; protein phosphorylation/dephosphorylation.

Alzheimer Disease

Evidence that Alzheimer neurofibrillary tangles originate from neurotubules.

Antiserum against normal human neurotubules purified by in-vitro assembly precipitated both neurotubules and a polypeptide isolated from Alzheimer neurofibrillary tangles in Ouchterlony double-diffusion tests. The antiserum specifically labelled neurofibrillary tangles, in isolated neurons by immunofluorescence and in tissue sections by the peroxidase-antiperoxidase technique. These results indicate that neurofibrillary tangles in Alzheimer's disease probably originate from neurotubules.

Adult

Alzheimer neurofibrillary tangles: antiserum and immunohistological staining.

A 50,000-dalton polypeptide has been purified from fractions enriched with neurofibrillary tangles of paired helical filaments from human autopsy specimens of Alzheimer disease and senile dementia of the Alzheimer type. An antiserum to this polypeptide was raised in a rabbit. This antiserum formed an immunoprecipitation line with the purified antigen and with human neurotubules in ouchterlony double-diffusion plates. The reactivity of the anti-paired helical filament protein serum with neurofibrillary tangles was studied by immunofluorescence on cryostat sections of hippocampus from Alzheimer autopsy tissue and by the peroxidase-antiperoxidase technique on paraffin sections of an Alzheimer brain biopsy. The tangles were stained with the antiserum in both systems. Preimmune rabbit serum and unrelated hyperimmune sera, used as controls, did not stain the tangles. These results show that the 50,000-dalton polypeptide purified from the neurofibrillary tangle-enriched fractions is a constituent of Alzheimer neurofibrillary tangles and, perhaps, of the paired helical filaments of which the tangles are composed.

Alzheimer Disease

Brain aluminum in aging and Alzheimer disease.

Aluminum was assayed by atomic absorption spectroscopy in 274 brain samples, and assayed in neurons isolated in bulk from the frontal cortex of patients with Alzheimer dementia and from age-matched patients with no neurologic disease. Brain aluminum concentration increased with age, from late middle age to old age. There were no statistically significant differences in brain aluminum concentration between the 10 patients with Alzheimer disease (mean, 2.7 microgram per gram dry weight of tissue; mean age, 81 years), and the 9 nonneurologic controls (mean, 2.5 microgram per gram; mean age, 73 years). In both groups, the hippocampus had the highest concentration of aluminum (5.6 microgram per gram), and the corpus callosum the lowest (1.5 microgram per gram).

Adult

Chemical relationship of the paired helical filaments of Alzheimer's dementia to normal human neurofilaments and neurotubules.

Intraneuronal fibrillary tangles are prominent features of several neurological diseases, including especially Alzheimer presenile and senile dementia, and to a much lesser degree in the normal aged human brain. These tangles are made up of abnormal fibrillar elements each about 22 nm at its widest, periodically reduced to 10 nm at about every 80 nm. Each abnormal fiber seems to be a pair of 10 nm filaments helically wound around each other. In this study the protein subunit of these paired helical filaments isolated from cases of Alzheimer's dementia was compared with the major protein subunits of normal neurofilaments and neurotubules by two-dimensional peptide maps of the tryptic or chymotryptic digests of these proteins labelled with 125I. The paired helical filament protein is very similar in its peptide maps to identically treated major neurofilament protein and to the beta monomer of neurotubule, while it is not so similar to the alpha tubulin. These data suggest that the paired helical filament protein subunit is closely related chemically to the normal neurofilament protein subunit, and the beta tubulin.

Alzheimer Disease

Encephalitogenic properties of purified preparations of bovine oligodendrocytes tested in guinea pigs.

The present study has investigated central nervous system disease in guinea pigs inoculated with emulsions containing purified preparations of bovine oligodendroglia and their fractions isolated with or without trypsinization, whole bovine white matter or myelin basic protein (MBP). The MBP content of the oligodendroglial fractions was determined by radioimmunoassay. It was found that oligodendroglia prepared from trypsinized fresh brain contained minute amounts of MBP and did not induce disease. The corresponding cell fraction from non-trypsinized frozen brain was rich in MBP and induced disease. Bovine white matter and MBP induced typical experimental allergic encephalomyelitis (EAE). The structural preservation of the non-encephalitogenic trypsinized MBP-poor cells was very good and that of the encephalitogenic MBP-rich non-trypsinized cells very poor. It has been concluded that the encephalitogenicity observed was due to MBP, rather than to a specific oligodendroglial antigen.

Animals