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Review
. 2018 Aug 10;18(10):67.
doi: 10.1007/s11910-018-0874-y.

The Genetics of Dementia with Lewy Bodies: Current Understanding and Future Directions

Tatiana Orme  1   2 , Rita Guerreiro  1   2   3 , Jose Bras  4   5   6
Affiliations
Review

The Genetics of Dementia with Lewy Bodies: Current Understanding and Future Directions

Tatiana Orme et al. Curr Neurol Neurosci Rep. .

Abstract

Purpose of review: Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) is a neurodegenerative disease that can be clinically and pathologically similar to Parkinson's disease (PD) and Alzheimer's disease (AD). Current understanding of DLB genetics is insufficient and has been limited by sample size and difficulty in diagnosis. The first genome-wide association study (GWAS) in DLB was performed in 2017; a time at which the post-GWAS era has been reached in many diseases.

Recent findings: DLB shares risk loci with AD, in the APOE E4 allele, and with PD, in variation at GBA and SNCA. Interestingly, the GWAS suggested that DLB may also have genetic risk factors that are distinct from those in AD and PD. Although off to a slow start, recent studies have reinvigorated the field of DLB genetics and these results enable us to start to have a more complete understanding of the genetic architecture of this disease.

Keywords: DLB; Dementia with Lewy bodies; GWAS; Genetics; Next-generation sequencing.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of Interest

Tatiana Orme reports grants from the Lewy Body Society. Rita Guerreiro and Jose Bras report grants from the Alzheimer’s Society.

Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent

This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Number of publications and important landmarks in Dementia with Lewy bodies. a Number of research publications in Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and dementia with Lewy bodies from 1995 to 2017. Research publications are far fewer in dementia with Lewy bodies as compared to Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s diseases. The terms ‘Alzheimer’s disease’, ‘Parkinson’s disease’ and ‘Dementia with Lewy bodies’ were used as input for PubMed and the resulting number of publications per year were plotted. The time points begin in 1995, when DLB was first established as a disease entity. b Timeline of important landmarks in dementia with Lewy bodies. Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease were proposed as disease entities many years before the establishment of DLB as a disease (1817, 1906 versus 1976); however, cortical Lewy bodies were identified in 1960. The first diagnostic criteria for DLB were established in 1996, and updated in 2005 and 2017. This timeline has been created using the historical landmarks for DLB from Kenji Kosaka’s chapter (chapter 1), in his recent book [33]. PD = Parkinson’s disease, AD = Alzheimer’s disease, DLB = dementia with Lewy bodies
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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