Natural compounds as therapeutic agents for amyloidogenic diseases

Abstract

This edited volume concerns a group of devastating neurological disorders that share a common pathological mechanism, namely the aggregation and deposition of insoluble, proteinaceous lesions, termed ‘amyloid’. Examples of cerebral amyloid disorders include common neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s disease-related dementia and Parkinson’s disease, as well as other less prevalent conditions like Huntington’s disease, cerebral amyloid angiopathy and the transmissible prion disorders. A disease-modifying therapeutic agent is still lacking for all these diseases, and there are no approved therapies that target amyloid formation directly. Nevertheless, a large and complex group of natural aromatic compounds known as polyphenols are rapidly emerging as potentially potent anti-amyloidogenic agents.