Caenorhabditis elegans as a model system for Parkinson's disease.

Parkinson's disease (PD) is one of the most common age-related neurodegenerative diseases that is characterized by selective loss of dopaminergic neurons. Despite recent findings from mammalian model systems, molecular mechanisms of the pathophysiology are poorly understood. Given the high conservation of molecular pathways from invertebrates to mammalians, combined with technical advantages, such as high-throughput approaches, Caenorhabditis elegans represents a powerful system for the identification of factors involved in neurodegeneration. In this review we describe that C. elegans can be used to advance our understanding of the genetic mechanisms implicated in these disorders. 2007 S. Karger AG, Basel