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[email protected] 1006 CNS & Neurological Disorders - Drug Targets, 2012, 11, 1006-1011 An Overview on Potential Neuroprotective Compounds for Management of Alzheimer’s Disease Ishfaq Ahmed Sheikh1,§, Riyasat Ali2,§, Tanveer A. Dar 3 and Mohammad Amjad Kamal*,1 1King Fahd Medical Research Center, King Abdulaziz University, P.O. Box 80216, Jeddah 21589, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia 2Department of Biochemistry, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, 110029, India 3Department of Clinical Biochemistry, University of Kashmir, Hazratbal, Srinagar, 190006, India Abstract: Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is one of the major neurodegenerative diseases affecting almost 28 million people around the globe. It consistently remains one of the major health concerns of present world. Due to the clinical limitations like severe side effects of some synthesized drugs, alternative forms of treatments are gaining global acceptance in the treatment of AD. Neuroprotective compounds of natural origin and their synthetic derivatives exhibit promising results with minimal side effects and some of them are in their different phases of clinical trials. Alkaloids and their synthetic derivatives form one of the groups which have been used in treatment of neurodegenerative diseases like AD. We have further grouped these alkaloids into different sub groups like Indoles, piperdine and isoquinolines. Polyphenols form another important class of natural compounds used in AD management. Keywords: Alkaloids, polyphenols, Alzheimer’s disease, neuroprotective function. INTRODUCTION been proposed as one of the alternative forms of the treatment. Large number of these molecules have been Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the most common type of reported to play significant roles in removal of deficiency of dementia and it accounts for an estimated 60 to 80 percent of neurotransmitters either by increasing their level using reported cases of dementia [1].