Domenico Praticò • Patrizia Mecocci
Editors
2013
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) has no racial, socioeconomic, or geographic boundaries, since it is the most common cause of dementia in elderly individuals throughout the world. As people worldwide live to an older age, AD has become a serious ever-growing public health problem. The importance and the scientifi c challenges of this disease have been well recognized by the neuroscience research community. Approximately 5 % of AD is caused by missense mutations in the gene for either the amyloid β precursor protein (APP) or some of the enzymes (i.e., presenilin-1) involved in its metabolism. However, in its sporadic form, which is the most frequent, the cause(s) remains unknown.