eCAM 2007;4(2)263–265 doi:10.1093/ecam/nel115 Education Section Mitochondrial Nutrition as a Strategy for Neuroprotection in Parkinson’s Disease—Research Focus in the Department of Alternative Medicine and Experimental Therapeutics at Hokuriku University Yasuhide Mitsumoto Department of Alternative Medicine and Experimental Therapeutics, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hokuriku University and Division of Pharmaceutical Health Sciences, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hokuriku University, Kanazawa, Ishikawa 920-1181, Japan Department Overview The Department of Alternative Medicine and Experimental Therapeutics employs a wide array of experimental models of neurodegenerative and stress- related diseases, such as Parkinson’s disease (PD) and depression, in order to establish the neuroprotective and anti-stress strategies that can be applicable for both normal humans and patients with the diseases. A central theme of our Department is to verify the alternative medical approaches to prevent and/or treat neurodegenerative and stress-related diseases in animal models. To achieve this goal, we focus on three nonpharmacological approaches: nutrition, exercise and control of mental environment. In addition to investigat- ing the usefulness of these nonpharmacological strategies, we elucidate detailed action mechanisms of alternative medical approaches to clearly demonstrate neuroprotec- tive effect and improvement of emotional abnormality. In this section, background for the nutritional research in our Department is summarized. For reprints and all correspondence: Prof. Yasuhide Mitsumoto, PhD, Department of Alternative Medicine and Experimental Therapeutics, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hokuriku University and Division of Pharmaceutical Health Sciences, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hokuriku University, Kanazawa, Ishikawa 920-1181 Japan. Tel: þ81-76-229-6229 (ext. 258); Fax: þ81-76-229-6207; E-mail: y-mitsumoto@hokuriku-u.ac.jp Research Background PD is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder charac- terized by the core symptom bradykinesia, rest tremor, rigidity and postural stability (1). Currently, pharma- cotherapy and surgical approaches for the treatments of PD can only improve the neurological symptoms. Although these symptomatic therapies can provide benefit, intervention that can slow or halt the progression of PD is an important consideration of overall treatment. Post-mortem examination of parkinsonian brains reveals a number of neurochemical and histological abnormal- ities. The most striking phenomenon is the loss of nigrostriatal dopaminergic neurons. This manifests as a loss of pigmented cells in the substantia nigra and of dopamine (DA) in the caudate and putamen of the dorsal striatum. Extensive degeneration of these neurons is required for clinical deficits. Indeed, even patients with relatively mild symptoms have striatal DA depletions of 80% (2,3). Therefore, neuroprotective therapies using pharmacological and nonpharmacological approaches may delay the progression of pathogenesis in PD. Neuroprotection Exploratory Trials in Parkinson’s Disease (NET-PD) sponsored by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke in the United States were begun to test whether several possible neuroprotective agents could prevent the progression of PD. NET-PD is a series of clinical research studies conducted at many centers in an effort to find drugs to slow the progression of PD. For this trial, several neuroprotective agents were identified through a systema- tic assessment by a group comprising experts in PD, 2007 The Author(s) This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc/2.0/uk/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.