Zhang Meng, Bian Zhigang
Department of Gerontology and Geriatrics, Shengjing Hospital of China Medical University, Shenyang, China.
Department of Otolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery, Shengjing Hospital of China Medical University, Shenyang, China.
Front Aging Neurosci. 2021 Jul 12;13:691512. doi: 10.3389/fnagi.2021.691512. eCollection 2021.
Alzheimer's disease (AD) and Parkinson's disease (PD) are two neurodegenerative diseases (NDDs) commonly found in elderly patients that are difficult to diagnose and lack effective treatment. Currently, the available diagnostic methods for these two NDDs do not meet clinical diagnostic expectations. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are a diverse group of endogenous non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) found in eukaryotic cells. Emerging studies suggest that altered expression of circRNAs is involved in the pathological processes of NDDs. CircRNAs could also prove to be promising biomarkers for the early diagnosis of NDDs such as AD and PD. Growing evidence has improved our knowledge of the roles of circRNAs in NDDs, which may lead to new therapeutic approaches that target transcription for preventing neurodegeneration. In this review, we describe the formation mechanisms and functions of circRNAs as well as methods of validation. We also discuss the emerging role of circRNAs in the pathophysiology of AD and PD and their potential value as biomarkers and therapeutic targets for AD and PD in the future.
阿尔茨海默病（AD）和帕金森病（PD）是老年患者中常见的两种神经退行性疾病（NDDs），难以诊断且缺乏有效治疗方法。目前，这两种NDDs的现有诊断方法未达到临床诊断预期。环状RNA（circRNAs）是在真核细胞中发现的一类多样的内源性非编码RNA（ncRNAs）。新兴研究表明，circRNAs表达的改变参与了NDDs的病理过程。CircRNAs也可能成为AD和PD等NDDs早期诊断的有前景的生物标志物。越来越多的证据增进了我们对circRNAs在NDDs中作用的认识，这可能会带来针对转录以预防神经退行性变的新治疗方法。在本综述中，我们描述了circRNAs的形成机制和功能以及验证方法。我们还讨论了circRNAs在AD和PD病理生理学中的新作用及其作为AD和PD未来生物标志物和治疗靶点的潜在价值。
