Patent ID: 8138148

Claim:
A method of stimulating neurite outgrowth and/or increasing neuronal cell survival in a subject, comprising administering to said subject an effective amount of a compound which is a non-naturally occurring multimer comprising two or more peptides, which peptides may be the same or different, each peptide independently consisting of a sequence of 7 to 22 contiguous amino acid residues and comprising the formula (I): X a -( x )-X b -X c -X d -X f wherein X a is amino acid residue D, E or A, (x) is a sequence of two amino acid residues selected from V-S, K-I, L-S and L-G X b , is amino acid residue F, L or W, and at least one of X c , X d or X f is a charged or hydrophobic amino acid residue, with the proviso that X f is not D or E, wherein said compound is not a homodimer consisting of two identical monomers in which the identical monomers are covalently linked by a disulfide bond, said compound being capable of stimulating neurite outgrowth or increasing neuronal cell survival.