Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors: Novel Targets for Neurological Diseases
A special issue of Brain Sciences (ISSN 2076-3425). This special issue belongs to the section "Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (25 February 2021) | Viewed by 4335
Special Issue Editor
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (AChR) play pivotal roles in the etiology of neurological disorders. The most well-known example is the AChR at the skeletal muscle neuromuscular junction, in which auto-antibodies against AChR subunits are a major underlying cause of Myasthenia Gravis. Although first reported in the 1970’s, Myasthenia Gravis remains a well-studied neurological disease and AChR remains a target for treatment. The skeletal muscle AChR is also a target for treatment of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. Although the first AChR discovered, the subunits of the skeletal muscle AChR (αβδε) are not the phylogenetically older subunits and are not the subunits typically associated with the mammalian central and other peripheral nervous systems (α2-7, 9-10, and β2-4).
The AChR subunits expressed at synaptic and non-synaptic sites throughout the body are also important therapeutic targets for several neurological disorders. For example, α7 is a potential therapeutic target for neurodevelopmental disorders, such as schizophrenia. α9 is a potential therapeutic target for glioblastoma. α6β2 is a therapeutic target for neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s. The α5α3β4 receptor is a target for nicotine dependence. Immune cells also express AChR subunits, and can affect neurological disorders, such as multiple sclerosis.
AChR make good therapeutic targets for neurological diseases because they are often modulatory and regulate the primary neurotransmitters glutamate or dopamine. In other instances, AChR gene duplication or deletion is causative in neurological disease. CHRNA7, for example, is an important gene in the 15q13.3 microdeletion syndrome. The α9 subunit is unique in that it is not expressed in normal brain, but may be expressed during migration and/or proliferation in glioblastoma.
In this topic section we will focus on novel therapies that target AChR, particularly in neurological disorders that are currently resistant to treatment.
Dr. Barbara J. Morley
Guest Editor
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Keywords
- Nicotinic acetylcholine receptor
- Therapeutic target
- Neurological disorder
- Autism
- Addiction
- Schizophrenia
- Myasthenia Gravis
- Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis
- Glioblastoma
- Multiple sclerosis
