Abstract： Alzheimer's disease(AD)is a neurodegenerative disease that often occurs in the elderly.Its pathogenesis is complex and treatment drugs are limited,which causes a huge burden to the society.Rhynchophylline is an indole alkaloid isolated from Uncaria rhynchophylla,which has remarkable neuropharmacological and anti-AD therapeutic effects via various mechanisms.This paper summarized the pathogenesis of AD in recent years,and proposed potential therapeutic targets for AD drug development.At the same time,the neuropharmacological action of rhynchophylline was reviewed to provide new ideas for the development of anti-AD drugs with rhynchophylline as the leading compound.