Please join us for a Molecular Horizons seminar presented by Dr Arne Ittner from the Dementia Research Centre, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences at Macquarie University. Title: Protein kinases, tau and Alzheimer’s disease A light lunch will be provided.
Molecular Horizons Seminar with Dr Arne Ittner
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Wollongong campus, Building 42, Room 101.
The microtubule-associated protein tau is a predominantly axonal neuronal protein and involved in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Tau is a target of multiple protein kinases and gets progressively hyper-phosphorylated at multiple sites, contributing to the formation of neurofibrillary tangles and cognitive decline in AD. My team’s work builds on the discovery of that a member of the p38 mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinase family targets tau at the post-synapse, thereby inhibiting toxic signals downstream of tau. This site-specific phosphorylation confers an unprecedented neuroprotective function of tau. We extend this work now to therapeutic concepts as well as to a broad approach to how site-specific and hyper-phosphorylation of tau are connected in health and disease.