Nicotinic acetylcholine binding sites in Alzheimer's disease.

In Alzheimer's disease (AD), there is a loss of presynaptic cholinergic markers in the cerebral cortex, but the nature of cholinergic receptor changes is unclear. In this study, [3H]acetylcholine and [3H]nicotine were used to label nicotinic cholinergic binding sites in cerebral cortical tissues obtained at autopsy from patients with AD and from matched controls. A consistent and severe loss of nicotinic receptors was found in AD.