Trivedi DK, Sinclair E, Xu Y, Sarkar D, Walton-Doyle C, Liscio C, Banks P, Milne J, Silverdale M, Kunath T, Goodacre R, Barran P. Discovery of Volatile Biomarkers of Parkinson's Disease from Sebum. ACS Cent Sci. 2019 Apr 24;5(4):599-606. Epub 2019 Mar 20 PubMed.

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  1. Trivedi et al. is a really well-done pilot study that builds on a comprehensive volatilome-analyzing platform.

    I find it intriguing that both eicosane and perillic aldehyde have also been identified in saliva, as the authors note. Some practitioners (including myself) sense that a “PD subject’s odor” in late-onset cases may be associated with changes in their breath, as well. I do not know whether this has been analyzed yet.

    In the future it will be important to attempt to control for many variables in a comparison of PD versus controls, e.g. medication, age, sex, perfume/deodorant use, diet, hydration status, bathing habits, clothing fabric, exercise, etc.

    Personally, I see two angles to further investigate, i.e., the skin microbiome as well as skin neurophysiology. For the former, there is an exciting rosacea story from the Danish registry, showing rosacea is a skin disease that poses a modifiable risk factor for PD (Egeberg et al., 2016). For the latter, there is published work by the Freeman lab on α-synucein staining of skin biopsies (Gibbons et al., 2016), which the team of Dr. Wolfgang Oertel in Germany is actively pursuing, as well.​​

    References:

    Egeberg A, Hansen PR, Gislason GH, Thyssen JP. Exploring the Association Between Rosacea and Parkinson Disease: A Danish Nationwide Cohort Study. JAMA Neurol. 2016 May 1;73(5):529-34. PubMed.

    View all comments by Michael Schlossmacher

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