A new approach for investigating neurodegenerative disorders in mice based on DSC

In this work, we develop a new approach based on differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) for diagnostics and characterization of the changes in the brain at molecular and supramolecular level associated with drug-induced neurodegenerative disorders. In order to test the DSC potential, we used an experimental animal model of scopolamine-induced dementia of Alzheimer's disease (AD) type. The DSC measurements taken on supernatants of brain tissue homogenates isolated from healthy animals and animals with scopolamine-induced dementia showed that heat capacity curves for animals with scopolamine-induced dementia strongly differ from the respective curves for healthy animals. The effects of preventive treatments with various substances and their combinations expected to have protective effect and hinder the development of AD (myrtenal, ellagic acid, lipoic acid, ascorbic acid) are also clearly displayed in the calorimetric scans. These measurements show that DSC is an appropriate method for detection and characterization of the compositional changes taking place in affected by dementia brain tissues.