Volume 14 Issue 6, June 2018

In a recent study, individuals with brain amyloid-β accumulation but no cognitive impairment were classified as being at risk of Alzheimer disease, yet amyloid-β is widely considered to be a pathological biomarker of Alzheimer disease rather than a risk factor — it cannot be both.

New research has found that anaesthesia and surgery are associated with increased blood levels of two markers of neuronal injury — neurofilament light (NFL) and tau. The findings highlight the neurotoxic effects of anaesthesia and surgery and indicate that tau and NFL could present useful biomarkers for postoperative neurocognitive disorders.

An incomplete grasp of how the G₄C₂ repeat expansion in C9orf72 leads to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal dementia has hindered progress in treatment development. Now, a study has combined unbiased genetic screens and CRISPR–Cas9 gene editing to validate known molecular pathways and identify novel therapeutic targets involved in G₄C₂ repeat pathogenesis.

Despite advances in the treatment of ischaemic stroke, functional outcomes are still suboptimal in many patients. Baron discusses approaches to further limit the spread of brain ischaemia by ‘freezing’ the penumbra — that is, the at-risk but not yet infarcted tissue.

Treatments that target calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP) and its receptor are proving effective for migraine treatment. In this Review, Edvinsson et al. trace the translation of CGRP biology into successful therapies and consider exactly where these drugs act.

In this Review, Almad and Maragakis look at the technological advances that are transforming our understanding of astrocytes and explain how these techniques can be used to study neurological diseases in which astrocytes are important.

Frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) is a highly heterogeneous group of neurodegenerative diseases. This Review considers the phenotypic and genotypic differences among those with the most common form of FTLD—characterized by TDP43 pathology—with a view to improve patient care and facilitate current efforts to identify effective therapies for these individuals.