Hormones in Neurodegeneration, Neuroprotection and Neurogenesis

As life expectancy increases and population ages, the already enormous impact of neurodegeneration on society will become even larger without better prevention and treatment. Developing strategies to prevent degeneration of neurons and to promote a healthy nervous system is, thus, critical. The development of pharmacological agents that would increase production of new neurons was recently facilitated by the identification of the hormonal regulators of various steps of adult neurogenesis. Written by a group of top world experts involved in the study of the mechanisms of hormonal control of brain damage and repair, this book gives a comprehensive account of the neuroprotective and neurogenic effects of steroid and polypeptide hormones. It discusses the effects of thyroid and steroid hormones (estrogens, androgens, progestins, gluco-mineralo-corticoids, various neurosteroids) or polypeptide hormones (CRF, urocortins, somatostastin, GH/IGF, leptin, prolactin, glucagon peptides, PACAP, erythropoetin) on neuronal survival and neurogenesis in various neurodegenerative conditions and in brain aging in detail. Furthermore, the book presents new pharmacological approaches for treatment of neurodegenerative conditions based on the neuroprotective and neurogenic properties of natural and synthetic hormones. This is an essential resource for all neurobiologists, students and lecturers in pharmacy, endocrinologists, gynecologists, neurochemists, libraries and biotechnological institutes. Dr. Achille Gravanis is Professor in the Department of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, University of Crete, Greece. He obtained his Pharmacy Diploma from the University of Athens, and his PhD in Pharmacology from the University Paris 6. Achille Gravanis worked as a researcher in Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York. He participated as a member and Chairman of many research committees of the European Union, Elected Member of the Fellowships Committee of FEBS, External Reviewer Panel LS5, European Research Council, Member of the Editorial Board and Reviewer of many international scientific journals. His research focuses on the role of hormonal micro-environment in neurodegenerative diseases and the development of micromolecular neuroprotective and neurogenic compounds. Dr. Synthia H. Mellon is Professor in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, The Center for Reproductive Sciences, School of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco. She received her PhD in Biochemistry from Columbia University, New York, and postdoctoral training in the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. Synthia Mellon was awarded the Richard E. Weitzman Memorial Award from The Endocrine Society, was President of Women in Endocrinology, and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She has been a member of numerous Editorial Boards and review committees, and has served as a reviewer for numerous scientific journals. Her research focuses on the developmental regulation of steroid hormone production, and the role of neurosteroids in developmental and neurodegenerative disorders of the nervous system and in the etiology of neuropsychiatric disease. CONTENTS PREFACE ESTROGEN Interactions of estradiol and insulin-like growth factor-I in neuroprotection: implications for brain aging and neurodegeneration (Maria-Angeles Arevalo, Luis M. Garcia-Segura and Inigo Azcoitia) Structure-nongenomic neuroprotection relationship of estrogens and estrogen-derived compounds (James W. Simpkins, Kun Don Yi, Evelyn Perez and Douglas Covey) PROGESTINS Progestins and Neuroprotection: Why the choice of progestin matters (Meharvan Singh) Endogenous and synthetic neurosteroids in treatment of Niemann-Pick Type C disease (Synthia H. Mellon, Wenhui Gong and Marcus D. Schonemann) GLUCOCORTICOIDS Glucocorticoids, developmental "programming" and the risk of affective dysfunction (Bayanne Olabi and Jonathan Seckl) Regulation of structural plasticity and neurogenesis during stress and diabetes; protective effects of glucocorticoid receptor antagonists (Paul J. Lucassen, Carlos P. Fitzsimons, Erno Vreugdenhil, Pu Hu, Charlotte Oomen, Yanina Revsin, Marian Joels and E. Ron De Kloet) OTHER NEUROSTEROIDS Neuroactive steroids and peripheral neuropathy (Roberto C. Melcangi, Silvia Giatti, Marzia Pesaresi, Donatella Caruso and Marc J. Tetel) Neuroprotective and neurogenic properties of dehydroepiandrosterone and its synthetic analogs (Ioannis Charalampopoulos, Iakovos Lazaridis and Achille Gravanis) Neurosteroids and pain (Christine Patte-Mensah, Laurence Meyer, Veronique Schaeffer, Cherkaouia Kibaly and Ayikoe G. Mensah-Nyagan) POLYPEPTIDE HORMONES AND NEUROPROTECTION The insulin / IGF-1 system in neurodegeneration and neurovascular disease (Przemyslaw (Mike) Sapieha and Lois Smith) Leptin Neuroprotection in Central Nervous System (Feng Zhang, Suping Wang, Armando P. Signore Zhongfang Weng and Jun Chen) Somatostatin and neuroprotection in retina (Kyriaki Thermos) Neurotrophic effects of PACAP in the cerebellar cortex (Anthony Falluel-Morel, Hubert Vaudry, Hitoshi Komuro, Dariusz C Gorecki, Ludovic Galas and David Vaudry) The corticotropin releasing hormone in neuroprotection (Christian Behl and Angela Clement) Neuroprotective and neurogenic effects of erythropoietin (Helmar C. Lehmann and Ahmet Hoke) HORMONES AND NEUROGENESIS Thyroid hormone actions on glioma cells (Min Zhou, Harold K. Kimelberg, Faith B. Davis, Paul J. Davis) Gonadal hormones, neurosteroids and clinical progestins as neurogenic regenerative agents: Therapeutic implications (Lifei Liu and Roberta Diaz Brinton) Progestins: Obligatory developmental functions from embryogenesis through to the adult brain (Craig S. Atwood and Sivan Vadakkadath Meethal) Human neural progenitor cells: mitotic and neurogenic effects of growth factors, neurosteroids, and excitatory amino acids (Masatoshi Suzuki, Jacalyn McHugh and Narisorn Kitiyanant) Corticosterone, dehydroepiandrosterone and neurogenesis in the adult hippocampus (Joe Herbert and Scarlett B. Pinnock)