%0 Journal Article %A Emmanouilidou, E %A Papagiannakis, N %A Kouloulia, S %A Galaziou, A %A Antonellou, R %A Papadimitriou, D %A Athanasiadou, A %A Bozi, M %A Koros, C %A Maniati, M %A Vekrellis, K %A Ioannou, PC %A Stefanis, L %D 2020 %F discovery:10099182 %J Parkinsonism & Related Disorders %K A53T, Alpha-synuclein, Parkinson disease, Plasma, Serum %P 35-40 %T Peripheral alpha-synuclein levels in patients with genetic and non-genetic forms of Parkinson's disease %U https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10099182/ %V 73 %X BACKGROUND: Variations of α-synuclein levels have been reported in serum and plasma in Parkinson's Disease (PD) Patients. METHODS: Serum and plasma were obtained from PD patients without known mutations (GU-PD, n = 124)), carriers of the A53T/G209A point mutation in the α-synuclein gene (SNCA) (n = 29), and respective age-/sex-matched controls. Levels of total α-synuclein were assessed using an in-house ELISA assay. RESULTS: A statistically significant increase of α-synuclein levels was found in serum, but not plasma, from GU-PD patients compared to healthy controls. A statistically significant decrease of α-synuclein levels was found in serum and plasma from symptomatic A53T mutation carriers compared to healthy controls. Plasma α-synuclein levels were modestly negatively correlated with UPDRS part III score and disease duration in A53T-PD patients. CONCLUSION: Increased α-synuclein levels in serum of GU-PD patients suggest a systemic deregulation of α-synuclein homeostasis in PD. The opposite results in A53T-PD highlight the complexity of α-synuclein homeostatic regulation in PD, and suggest the possibility of reduced expression of the mutant allele. %Z This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher's terms and conditions.