Levels of reduced and oxidized coenzyme Q-10 and 8-hydroxy-2'-deoxyguanosine in the CSF of patients with Alzheimer's disease demonstrate that mitochondrial oxidative damage and/or oxidative DNA damage contributes to the neurodegenerative process.

To investigate the possibility that mitochondrial oxidative damage, oxidative DNA damage or both contribute to the neurodegenerative process of Alzheimer's disease (AD), we employed high-performance liquid chromatography using an electrochemical detector to measure the concentrations of the reduced and oxidized forms of coenzyme Q-10 (CoQ-10) and 8-hydroxy-2'-deoxyguanosine (8-OHdG) in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of 30 patients with AD and in 30 age-matched controls with no neurological disease. The percentage of oxidized/total CoQ-10 (%CoQ-10) in the CSF of the AD group (78.2 +/- 18.8%) was significantly higher than in the control group (41.3 +/- 10.4%) (P < 0.0001). The concentration of 8-OHdG in the CSF of AD patients was greater than in the CSF of controls (P < 0.0001) and was positively correlated with the duration of illness (r(s) = 0.95, P < 0.0001). The %CoQ-10 was correlated with concentrations of 8-OHdG in the CSF of AD patients (r(s) = 0.66, P < 0.001). The present study suggests that both mitochondrial oxidative damage and oxidative DNA damage play important roles in the pathogenesis of early AD development.