グリア細胞の病的構造物―神経変性疾患などにおける最近の知見を中心に

Some new observations on glial cell pathology in human brain diseases.

はじめに

　近年，ヒト神経疾患の病理学的知見にグリア細胞に関連する様々な病理変化の新知見が加えられ，神経細胞のみならずグリア細胞からの病理学的アプローチが注目されている。多くはその研究のいまだ過渡期にあるものであるが，本稿ではあえてそれらに関する，成書には記されていない最近の二，三のテーマを中心に概説し，今後の研究の発展への一助としたい。

1. Glial argyrophilic structures in various neurodegenerative diseases

In addition to the glial cytoplasmic inclusion in multiple system atrophy (Papp et al. 1989; Nakazato et al. 1990), recent studies have focused on glial changes in some neurodegenerative diseases, including progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), Pick's disease (PD), Alzheimer's disease (AD) and some dementias. Yamada et al. (1992) demonstrated tau-, Alz50-and paired helical filament (PHF)-positive glial cells (mainly consisting of GFAP-positve astrocytes) in brains from patients with PSP, and strongly suggested that these abnormal glial cells eventually developed to form “tufts of abnormal fibers” which were described as an unique pathology in PSP (Hauw et al. 1990). Nishimura et al.(1992) confirmed that astrocytes are also involved in PSP.