We first determined the extent to which organotypic brain slice cultures prepared from 3xTg-AD mice recapitulate the neurodegenerative molecular changes that develop in vivo18, 19 and in human AD brain.29 Cortical extracts from 3xTg-AD mice showed overexpression of total tau, as expected on the basis of human tau overexpression (Figure 1a). This evidence concerns the gene MAPT and Alzheimer disease.