Identification of the Alzheimer's disease amyloid precursor protein (APP) and its homologue APLP2 as essential modulators of glucose and insulin homeostasis and growth

Abstract

The amyloid precursor protein (APP), the source of the neurotoxic amyloid β (Aβ) peptide involved in Alzheimer's disease (AD), belongs to a conserved family of related proteins. In mammals, the APP family contains amyloid precursor-like protein 1 (APLP1) and amyloid precursor-like protein 2 (APLP2). Whilst a number of activities have been attributed to the APP family, an overall function has not been definitively established. While ablating either the APP or APLP2 gene in mice produces minimal phenotypic change, the combined knockout of these genes in mice causes postnatal mortality. Postnatal survival therefore requires a shared but unknown function of APP and APLP2. To investigate the bioc..