Adachi N, Numakawa T, Richards M, Nakajima S, Kunugi H. New insight in expression, transport, and secretion of brain-derived neurotrophic factor: Implications in brain-related diseases. World J Biol Chem 2014; 5(4): 409-428 [PMID: 25426265 DOI: 10.4331/wjbc.v5.i4.409]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Tadahiro Numakawa, PhD, Department of Mental Disorder Research, National Institute of Neuroscience, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry, 4-1-1 Ogawa-Higashi, Kodaira, Tokyo 187-8502, Japan. numakawa@ncnp.go.jp
Research Domain of This Article
Gastroenterology & Hepatology
Article-Type of This Article
Review
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Naoki Adachi, Tadahiro Numakawa, Shingo Nakajima, Hiroshi Kunugi, Department of Mental Disorder Research, National Institute of Neuroscience, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry, Tokyo 187-8502, Japan
Naoki Adachi, Tadahiro Numakawa, Hiroshi Kunugi, Core Research for Evolutional Science and Technology Program, Japan Science and Technology Agency, Saitama 332-0012, Japan
Misty Richards, Albany Medical College, Albany, NY 12208, United States
Author contributions: Adachi N wrote and edited the paper; Numakawa T wrote and edited the paper; Richards M wrote and edited the paper; Nakajima S edited the paper; Kunugi H edited the paper.
Supported by The Health and Labor Sciences Research Grants (Comprehensive Research on Disability, Health, and Welfare H21-kokoro-002) (H. K.); and the Core Research for Evolutional Science and Technology Program, CREST, Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) (T.N., N.A. and H.K.); the Naito Foundation (N.A), the Takeda Science Foundation (T. N.); a grant from Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B), (JSPS KAKENHI) (T. N.), No. 24300139; and Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research (JSPS KAKENHI) (T. N.) from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology of Japan, No. 25640019
Correspondence to: Tadahiro Numakawa, PhD, Department of Mental Disorder Research, National Institute of Neuroscience, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry, 4-1-1 Ogawa-Higashi, Kodaira, Tokyo 187-8502, Japan. numakawa@ncnp.go.jp
Telephone: +81-42-3412711 Fax: +81-42-3461744
Received: February 23, 2014 Revised: June 30, 2014 Accepted: August 27, 2014 Published online: November 26, 2014
Abstract
Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) attracts increasing attention from both research and clinical fields because of its important functions in the central nervous system. An adequate amount of BDNF is critical to develop and maintain normal neuronal circuits in the brain. Given that loss of BDNF function has been reported in the brains of patients with neurodegenerative or psychiatric diseases, understanding basic properties of BDNF and associated intracellular processes is imperative. In this review, we revisit the gene structure, transcription, translation, transport and secretion mechanisms of BDNF. We also introduce implications of BDNF in several brain-related diseases including Alzheimer’s disease, Huntington’s disease, depression and schizophrenia.
Core tip: Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) plays essential roles in the central nervous system (CNS) through a specific tropomyosin-related kinase receptor B (TrkB), contributing to neuronal survival, neurite outgrowth, and synaptic function. It is critically required for normal development and functions of the brain. A number of reports have shown an importance of BDNF in the pathophysiology of brain-associated diseases. This review describes molecular mechanisms underlying gene expression, transport, and secretion of BDNF and its function in the CNS. We further introduce recent findings on the possible involvement of BDNF in the pathophysiology of neurodegenerative and psychiatric diseases, and the potential effectiveness of enhancing BDNF/TrkB system for therapeutic applications.
