Dementia study using induced pluripotent stem cells

Recent developments in induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) technology have facilitated, and have contributed to overcome the difficulty of modeling dementia caused by Alzheimer's disease (AD), dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), and frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD), etc. The following models using iPSCs were reported: the pathophysiology caused by gene mutations such as presenilin or amyloid β precursor protein in AD, α-synuclein in DLB, and microtubule-associated protein tau, fused in sarcoma, progranulin, or chromosome 9 open reading frame 72 in FTLD, anti-AD drug screening, sortilin-related receptor L 1 haplotype influence in sporadic AD, and amyloid β secretion in Down syndrome. Patient-specific iPSC could be expected to reveal the disease pathology and lead to drug discoveries for dementia patients.