Affiliations: [a]
Achucarro Basque Center for Neuroscience, Zamudio, Bizkaia, Spain and Ikerbasque Foundation for Science, Bilbao, Bizkaia, Spain
| [b] Health Sciences Research Centre, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Beira Interior, Covilhã, Portugal
| [c] Institute of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal
| [d] Institute for Biomedical Imaging and Life Sciences (IBILI), Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal
| [e] CNC.IBILI Consortium, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal
Correspondence:
[*]
Correspondence to: João O. Malva, Institute for Biomedical Imaging and Life Sciences (IBILI), Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra, 3000-548 Coimbra, Portugal. Tel.: +351 239 480200; E-mail: jomalva@fmed.uc.pt.
Abstract: The cognitive reserve is associated with the capacity of the brain to maintain cognitive performance in spite of being challenged by stressful degenerative insults related to aging. Hippocampal neurogenesis is a life-long process of continuous addition of functional new neurons in the memory processing circuits. Accordingly, adult hippocampal neurogenesis is increasingly seen as a key determinant of cognitive reserve robustness. On the other side, neuroinflammation, by releasing a plethora of proinflammatory cytokines and other inflammatory molecules, is increasingly shown to be one of the key determinant pathophysiological factors that negatively impact on neurogenesis and on the cognitive reserve, playing a detrimental role in hippocampal neurogenic niche dynamics and in the progression of neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease. In the present manuscript, we highlight the functional interplay between neuroinflammation, dynamics of the neurogenic niche, and spatial memory performance in healthy and age-related pathological processes, including progression of Alzheimer’s disease.
