MAPT and Alzheimer disease: Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is characterized by extracellular deposits of β-amyloid plaques (Glenner et al., 1984) and intracellular neurofibrillary tangles (NFTs) consisting of abnormally hyperphosphorylated aggregates of the microtubule (MT) associated protein tau (Grundke-Iqbal et al., 1986a,b).