ROLE OF FOXO3 IN REGULATION OF NEURODEGENERATIVE DISORDERS

Abstract

Neurodegenerative disorders are conditions arising from the loss of structure and function of neurons. An alarming number of people are affected by them around the world. These disorders cause serious health conditions and ultimately death. Some of these include Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, and Huntington’s disease among others. Currently, there are no treatments that can cure these diseases but their progression can be slowed down. Our approach is to study the use of FOXO proteins as therapeutic targets for the effective treatment of such neurodegenerative disorders. FOX family proteins are a group of forkhead transcription factors consisting of several subclasses from ‘A’ to ‘S’ but will keep our focus on the FOXO subclass which are present in all cells of the body and help in the growth, development, and maintenance of cells. FOXO proteins are basically transcription factors that bind to DNA through their DNA binding domain and bring about expression regulation in the cells. FOXO proteins subclass is further divided into 6 more members i.e. FOXO1 to FOXO6. But in neuronal cells, their specific expression was observed that makes a scope for them to facilitate neuronal cell protection by regulating and interacting with different signal transduction pathways. In the FOX family, the most relevant and effective targets will be FOXO proteins for neurodegenerative disorders because the pathways they regulate can actually help in blocking neurodegeneration and provide scope for treatment.