Alzheimer’s Disease: Distinct Stages in Neurogenic Decline?

The functional connection of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) with adult neurogenesis remains a lingering question in the field. A deep understanding of the detrimental effects of AD pathology on neurogenesis and a potentially compensatory role for newborn neurons in dementia may lead to a more complete picture of AD pathology and new therapeutic avenues. The few human autopsy studies that have been conducted are as inconsistent as the results from mouse models, including diametrically opposed reports in some cases. The study by Ekonomou et al. (1) tries to resolve this issue by applying stringent exclusion criteria for the examination of a clearly defined population of postmortem AD brains at various stages. Using multiple neurogenic markers for different maturation levels along with glial markers, the aim of this study is to complement the pathologic picture. The main observation of the study by Ekonomou et al. is a decrease in newly generated neurons in the dentate gyrus (DG) with advancing Braak stages (more severe tau pathology). This decrease was found only at the level of immature