- Procognitive Compounds Promote Neurite Outgrowth.
Procognitive Compounds Promote Neurite Outgrowth.
To this date, the only available drugs for treating Alzheimer's disease are cognitive enhancers, which may improve the cognitive function of patients for a few years while the disease continues to progress. As such, there are intense investigations to develop disease-modifying drugs to suppress progressive neurodegeneration. In this study, a range of procognitive compounds are tested in a primary neuronal culture to determine their relative potential for promoting neuritogenesis. We report that donepezil, memantine, dimebon, Pre-084 and 4-IBP are neuritogenic while tacrine, rosemarinic acid, memoquin and a BACE1 inhibitor suppress neurite outgrowth of neurons. The results of this study indicate that some procognitive compounds may possess a disease-modifying potential.