The Minnesota NeuroSpin Initiative is pleased to invite you to its seventh seminar for the Fall 2022/Spring 2023 season. On March 24, Dr. Dezhi Liao, PhD, Professor, University of Minnesota will discuss his recent work related to:
Tau mislocalization to dendritic spines is a common mechanism in neurodegenerative diseases including AD and PD
Progressively more research suggests that diverse neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and Parkinson’s disease (PD) share common pathological hallmarks and cellular mechanisms. One such mechanism involves the redistribution of microtubule associated protein tau (MAPT) from the axon into the somatodendritic compartments of neurons, leading to loss of tau polarity. Under normal physiological conditions, the distribution of tau proteins is polar. Tau is enriched in axons and has low presence in postsynaptic structures including the soma, dendrites and dendritic spines. In our recent studies, we found that the tau polarity is lost or reversed in neurodegenerative diseases. The loss of polarity is followed by mislocalization of tau into dendritic spines, the postsynaptic structures found in most excitatory glutamatergic synapses, and subsequent postsynaptic deficits and cognitive impairments. The clarification of the signaling steps that lead to tau-mediated synaptic deficits and cognitive impairments will shed new mechanistic insight on the pathogenesis of AD and PD. It may also uncover novel drug targets for treating and preventing these diseases. The combination of live imaging technique and spintronic technology will allow us to longitudinally monitor tau trafficking and electrophysiological activities at multiple time points and will be a powerful tool for mechanistic studies of tau mislocalization.
Seminar Details
Seminar Host
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Prof. Jian-Ping Wang, University of Minnesota
Seminar Speaker
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Dezhi Liao, Professor Department of Neuroscience in the Medical School at the University of Minnesota
Date and Time
- March 24, 2023
- 11:30am-12:30pm CT
This is past event and Registration is closed.
Speaker Bio
Dr. Dezhi Liao, PhD, is a professor in the Department of Neuroscience at the University of Minnesota. His research is focused upon the roles of tau in pathophysiology of neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s diseases, Frontotemporal dementia and chronic traumatic encephalopathy. He developed a live cell imaging technique that allows chronic visualization of the same dendritic spines for weeks in mature cultured neurons as old as 2 months in vitro. Combing this technique and his other expertise, he has completed some impactful studies of neurodegenerative diseases. His group is one of the two groups who independently demonstrate that invasion of dendritic spines by phosphorylated tau induces synaptic dysfunction in cellular and animal models of frontotemporal dementia with parkinsonism linked to chromosome-17 (FTDP-17) (Liao) and Alzheimer’s disease (AD) (Ittner). Their more recent works indicates that tau mislocalization to dendritic spines can be induced by P301L mutation in tau, Abeta oligomers, A53T α-synuclein, and mechanical stretching, indicating that it is a common mechanism in multiple neurodegenerative diseases.