Evidence for a common pathway linking neurodegenerative diseases

In the largest Parkinson's disease genome-wide association studies to date, common variants in three familiar genes-SNCA, MAPT and LRRK2-and two new loci are found to increase disease susceptibility. The studies suggest genetic heterogeneity for Parkinson's disease risk in different human populations and lend support to the idea of a common pathway for Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases.