Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Microglia And Complement In Alzheimer's Disease With Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy, Matthew K. Zabel

Loma Linda University Electronic Theses, Dissertations & Projects

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the most common form of dementia and completely lacks any viable, long-term therapeutic intervention. This is partly due to an incomplete understanding of AD etiology and the possible confounding factors associated with its genotypic and phenotypic heterogeneity. Cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) is a common, yet frequently overlooked, pathology associated with AD. A pathological hallmark of AD consists of extracellular amyloid-beta (Aβ) deposits, while CAA

manifests with deposition Aβ within the smooth muscle layer of cerebral arteries and arterioles. The role of Aβ in AD and CAA pathophysiology has long been controversial. Although it may have toxic …

Quantification Of Localized Brain Iron Sources Using Magnetic Resonance Phase, Grant Alexander Mcauley

Loma Linda University Electronic Theses, Dissertations & Projects

Brain microbleeds (BMB), often present in cerebrovascular and neurodegenerative diseases and neurotrauma, are associated with both chronic and acute illness of significant social and economic impact. Because BMB present a source of potentially cyctotoxic iron to the brain proportional to the amount of extravasated blood, non-invasive quantification of this iron pool is potentially valuable both to assess tissue risk and as a biomarker to monitor disease progression, treatment efficacy, and inform treatment. Past efforts to quantify brain iron have focused on distributed (e.g., anatomical) brain regions. However, BMB represent localized sources of iron deposition. In addition, conventional "magnitude" MR images …