TY  - JOUR
AU  - Salazar Campos, José María
AU  - Burbulla, Lena F
AU  - Jäkel, Sarah
TI  - Are oligodendrocytes bystanders or drivers of Parkinson's disease pathology?
JO  - PLoS biology
VL  - 23
IS  - 1
SN  - 1544-9173
CY  - Lawrence, KS
PB  - PLoS
M1  - DZNE-2025-00097
SP  - e3002977
PY  - 2025
AB  - The major pathological feature of Parkinson 's disease (PD), the second most common neurodegenerative disease and most common movement disorder, is the predominant degeneration of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra, a part of the midbrain. Despite decades of research, the molecular mechanisms of the origin of the disease remain unknown. While the disease was initially viewed as a purely neuronal disorder, results from single-cell transcriptomics have suggested that oligodendrocytes may play an important role in the early stages of Parkinson's. Although these findings are of high relevance, particularly to the search for effective disease-modifying therapies, the actual functional role of oligodendrocytes in Parkinson's disease remains highly speculative and requires a concerted scientific effort to be better understood. This Unsolved Mystery discusses the limited understanding of oligodendrocytes in PD, highlighting unresolved questions regarding functional changes in oligodendroglia, the role of myelin in nigral dopaminergic neurons, the impact of the toxic environment, and the aggregation of alpha-synuclein within oligodendrocytes.
KW  - Oligodendroglia: metabolism
KW  - Oligodendroglia: pathology
KW  - Parkinson Disease: pathology
KW  - Parkinson Disease: metabolism
KW  - Parkinson Disease: genetics
KW  - Humans
KW  - alpha-Synuclein: metabolism
KW  - Dopaminergic Neurons: metabolism
KW  - Dopaminergic Neurons: pathology
KW  - Substantia Nigra: metabolism
KW  - Substantia Nigra: pathology
KW  - Animals
KW  - Myelin Sheath: metabolism
KW  - Myelin Sheath: pathology
KW  - alpha-Synuclein (NLM Chemicals)
LB  - PUB:(DE-HGF)16
C6  - pmid:39777410
C2  - pmc:PMC11709285
DO  - DOI:10.1371/journal.pbio.3002977
UR  - https://pub.dzne.de/record/275862
ER  -