Saturday, April 20, 2019

Reports related to neurodegenerative and neuromuscular disorders

Bondar VV, Adamski CJ, Onur TS, Tan Q, Wang L, Diaz-Garcia J, Park J, Orr HT, Botas J, Zoghbi HY. PAK1 regulates ATXN1 levels providing an opportunity to modify its toxicity in spinocerebellar ataxia type 1. Hum Mol Genet. 2018 Aug 15;27(16):2863-2873.PMID: 29860311; PMCID: PMC6077814.

From the abstract: "... Loss-of-function of fly Pak3 or Pak1, whose mammalian homologs belong to Group I of PAK proteins, reduces ATXN1 levels, and accordingly, improves disease pathology in a Drosophila model of SCA1. Knockdown of PAK1 potently reduces ATXN1 levels in mammalian cells ... this study identifies PAK signaling as a distinct molecular pathway that regulates ATXN1 levels and presents a promising opportunity to pursue for developing potential therapeutics for SCA1."

Adusumalli S, Ngian ZK, Lin WQ, Benoukraf T, Ong CT. Increased intron retention is a post-transcriptional signature associated with progressive aging and Alzheimer's disease. Aging Cell. 2019 Mar 13:e12928. PMID: 30868713.

From the abstract: "Intron retention (IR) by alternative splicing is a conserved regulatory mechanism that can affect gene expression and protein function during adult development and age-onset diseases. ... By profiling the transcriptome of Drosophila head cells at different ages, we observed a significant increase in IR events for many genes during aging. ... our results suggest that an increased IR is an conserved signature that is associated with aging. ... changes of IR pattern during aging may regulate the transition from healthy to pathological state in late-onset sporadic AD."

Wang TH, Wang SY, Wang XD, Jiang HQ, Yang YQ, Wang Y, Cheng JL, Zhang CT, Liang WW, Feng HL. Fisetin Exerts Antioxidant and Neuroprotective Effects in Multiple Mutant hSOD1 Models of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis by Activating ERK. Neuroscience. 2018 May 21;379:152-166. PMID: 29559385.

From the abstract: "Oxidative stress exhibits a central role in the course of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) ... Fisetin, a natural antioxidant, has shown benefits in varied neurodegenerative diseases. ... Three different hSOD1-related mutant models were used ... results indicate that fisetin protects cells from ROS damage and improves the pathological behaviors caused by oxidative stress in disease models related to SOD1 gene mutations ... providing a potential treatment for ALS."

Lakkappa N, Krishnamurthy PT, M D P, Hammock BD, Hwang SH. Soluble epoxide hydrolase inhibitor, APAU, protects dopaminergic neurons against rotenone induced neurotoxicity: Implications for Parkinson's disease. Neurotoxicology. 2019 Jan;70:135-145. PMID: 30472438.

From the abstract: "Epoxyeicosatrienoic acids (EETs), metabolites of arachidonic acid, play a crucial role in cytoprotection by attenuating oxidative stress, inflammation and apoptosis. EETs are rapidly metabolised in vivo by the soluble epoxide hydrolase (sEH). Increasing the half life of EETs by inhibiting the sEH enzyme is a novel strategy for neuroprotection. ... sEH inhibitors APAU was screened in silico and further evaluated for their antiparkinson activity against rotenone (ROT) induced neurodegeneration in N27 dopaminergic cell line and Drosophila melanogaster model of Parkinson disease (PD). ..."

 Krench M, Cho RW, Littleton JT. A Drosophila model of Huntington disease-like 2 exhibits nuclear toxicity and distinct pathogenic mechanisms from Huntington disease. Hum Mol Genet. 2016 Aug 1;25(15):3164-3177. PMID: 27288455; PMCID: PMC5179919.

From the abstract: "Huntington disease-like 2 (HDL2) and Huntington disease (HD) are adult-onset neurodegenerative diseases ... we generated and characterized a Drosophila HDL2 model and compared it with a previously established HD model. We find that neuronal expression of HDL2-Q15 is not toxic, while the expression of an expanded HDL2-Q138 protein is lethal. HDL2-Q138 forms large nuclear aggregates, with only smaller puncta observed in the cytoplasm. This is in contrast to what is observed in a Drosophila model of HD, where polyQ aggregates localize exclusively to the cytoplasm. ... We conclude that while HD and HDL2 have similar clinical profiles, distinct pathogenic mechanisms are likely to drive toxicity in Drosophila models of these disorders."

Poska H, Haslbeck M, Kurudenkandy FR, Hermansson E, Chen G, Kostallas G, Abelein A, Biverstål H, Crux S, Fisahn A, Presto J, Johansson J. Dementia-related Bri2 BRICHOS is a versatile molecular chaperone that efficiently inhibits Aβ42 toxicity in Drosophila. Biochem J. 2016 Oct 15;473(20):3683-3704. PMID: 27514716.

From the abstract: "Formation of fibrils of the amyloid-β peptide (Aβ) is suggested to play a central role in neurodegeneration in Alzheimer's disease (AD), for which no effective treatment exists. The BRICHOS domain is a part of several disease-related proproteins ... we find that transgenic expression of the Bri2 BRICHOS domain in the Drosophila central nervous system (CNS) or eyes efficiently inhibits Aβ42 toxicity. ... These findings suggest that Bri2 BRICHOS can be a physiologically relevant chaperone for Aβ in the CNS ..."

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