Development of anti-aβ vaccination as a promising therapy for Alzheimer's disease

Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia characterized by progressive neurodegeneration. Recently, a vaccine therapy for Alzheimer's disease was developed as a curative treatment. Although clinical trials of active vaccination for Alzheimer's disease were halted due to the development of meningoencephalitis in some patients, the clinical and pathological findings of treated patients suggest that the vaccine therapy is effective. Hence, newly designed vaccines are being invented to control excessive T-cell immune reactions after the human clinical trial. In this article, we will review conventional vaccine therapies and newly developed vaccine therapies, mainly DNA vaccines, for possible clinical application in the near future. (c) 2007 Prous Science. All rights reserved.