The Possible Roles of the Dentate Granule Cell’s Leptin and Other Ciliary Receptors in Alzheimer’s Neuropathology

Abstract

Dentate-gyral granule cells in the hippocampus plus dentate gyrus memory-recording/retrieving machine, unlike most other neurons in the brain, are continuously being generated in the adult brain with the important task of separating overlapping patterns of data streaming in from the outside world via the entorhinal cortex. This “adult neurogenesis” is driven by tools in the mature granule cell’s cilium. Here we report our discovery of leptin’s LepRb receptor in this cilium. In addition, we discuss how ciliary LepRb signaling might be involved with ciliary p75NTR and SSTR3 receptors in adult neurogenesis and memory formation as well as attenuation of Alzheimer’s neuropathology by reducing the production of its toxic amyloid-β-derived drivers.

Keywords

• adult neurogenesis
• Alzheimer’s disease
• amyloid-β
• amyloid-β oligomers
• ciliary LepRb
• dentate gyrus
• hippocampus
• hyperphosphorylated tau
• leptin
• memory formation
• p75NTR
• somatostatin receptor