Galgani Alessandro, Scotto Marco, Faraguna Ugo, Giorgi Filippo S
Department of Translational Research and of New Surgical and Medical Technologies, University of Pisa, 56125 Pisa, Italy.
Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, 16163 Genova, Italy.
Antioxidants (Basel). 2025 Feb 22;14(3):255. doi: 10.3390/antiox14030255.
Locus Coeruleus (LC) is a brain nucleus that is involved in a variety of key functions (ranging from attention modulation to sleep-wake cycle regulation, to memory encoding); its proper function is necessary both during brain development and for brain integrity maintenance, and both at the microscale and macroscale level. Due to their specific intrinsic and extrinsic features, LC cells are considered particularly susceptible to damage concerning a variety of insults. This explains LC involvement in degenerative diseases not only in adults (in the context of neurodegenerative disease, mainly), but also in children (in relation to early hypoxic damage and Down's Syndrome, among others). In this narrative review, we dissect the potential mechanisms through which LC is affected in different diseases, with a special emphasis on the high rate of activity it is subjected to and the oxidative stress associated with it. Further research aimed at deepening our understanding of these mechanisms is needed to enable the development of potential strategies in the future that could slow down LC degeneration in subjects predisposed to specific brain disorders.
蓝斑（LC）是一个参与多种关键功能的脑核（从注意力调节到睡眠-觉醒周期调节，再到记忆编码）；其正常功能在大脑发育过程中以及维持大脑完整性方面都是必需的，且在微观和宏观层面均如此。由于其特定的内在和外在特征，LC细胞被认为特别容易受到各种损伤的影响。这解释了LC不仅在成人中（主要在神经退行性疾病的背景下），而且在儿童中（与早期缺氧损伤和唐氏综合征等有关）参与退行性疾病。在这篇叙述性综述中，我们剖析了LC在不同疾病中受到影响的潜在机制，特别强调了其遭受的高活动率以及与之相关的氧化应激。需要进一步的研究来加深我们对这些机制的理解，以便未来能够制定出潜在的策略，减缓易患特定脑部疾病的个体中LC的退化。
