Open AccessThe Neuronal Ceroid‐Lipofuscinoses. Recent Advances
Author(s) -
Goebel Hans H.,
Sharp Julie D.
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
brain pathology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.986
H-Index - 132
eISSN - 1750-3639
pISSN - 1015-6305
DOI - 10.1111/j.1750-3639.1998.tb00142.x
Subject(s) - neurodegeneration , neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis , batten disease , biology , gene , lipofuscin , genetics , disease , neuroscience , pathology , medicine , biochemistry
The neuronal ceroid lipofuscinoses (NCLs) represent a group of neurodegenerative disorders characterised by progressive visual failure, neurodegeneration, epilepsy and the accumulation of an autofluorescent lipopigment in neurons and other cells. The main childhood subtypes are infantile (INCL; CLN1 ), classical late infantile (LINCL; CLN2 ) and juvenile NCL (J NCL; CLN3 ), distinguished on the basis of age of onset, clinical course and ultrastructural morphology, and recently genetic analysis. In addition several variant forms of the disease complex have been described as well as a rare adult onset form. Advances in both genetics and biochemistry have led to the identification of the genes for the three main subtypes of childhood NCL and their corresponding protein products and to mapping of two additional genes for two variant forms. The disease causing genes in both INCL and classical LINCL have been shown to encode lysosomal enzymes whilst the JNCL gene codes for a protein whose function is as yet unknown.