S. Cammarata et al., UBIQUITIN-REACTIVE NEURITES IN CEREBRAL-CORTEX OF SUBJECTS WITH HUNTINGTONS-CHOREA - A PATHOLOGICAL CORRELATE OF DEMENTIA, Neuroscience letters, 156(1-2), 1993, pp. 96-98
We studied the prevalence of ubiquitin-reactive dystrophic neurites in
neocortex of cases with Huntington's disease (HD), with a history of
dementia lasting from 5 to 8 years before death, and in four age-match
ed controls. The ubiquitin-reactive neurites, identified as round stru
ctures localized outside neuronal and glial cells, were quantified in
six microscopic fields of cingulate, 2nd temporal and 2nd parietal cor
tical gyri. The number of ubiquitin-reactive neurites in HD was 12 to
16 times that of controls in the three cortical areas examined. The fi
nding indicates that in HD neocortex there is a severe degeneration of
neuronal processes and suggests that it may represent a pathological
correlate of dementia.