Distribution of iron in a single neuron of patients with Parkinson's disease

✍ Scribed by Ali Ektessabi; Sohei Yoshida; Koji Takada

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1999
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 714 KB
• Volume: 28
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0049-8246
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1097-4539(199911/12)28:6<456::aid-xrs392>3.0.co;2-c

✦ Synopsis

Synchrotron radiation x-ray fluorescence (SRXRF) spectroscopy was applied to non-destructive elemental mapping in the melanized nigral neurons obtained from patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) and a control subject. The cause of PD is unknown but many researchers consider that excessive accumulation of metallic elements (mainly iron) has a role in the generative process of PD. Microbeam imaging (mapping of the elements) with a beam size of 6 × 8 µm and an energy of 13.5 keV was carried out in single neurons. The distributions of trace elements in the neurons were obtained in an area of about 100 × 100 µm. It is demonstrated that iron was accumulated in the neuromelanin aggregates in and around the nigral neurons, coprecipitating with sulfur, calcium, zinc and copper to various extents in both the diseased and control specimens. The average of the iron intensity measured inside of the melanin pigment granules of a PD case was about one order of magnitude higher than that of the control samples.