BACKGROUND: The disrupted in schizophrenia 1 (
METHODS: We measured cortical thickness, cortical surface area, subcortical volumes, and regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) in healthy controls (HC) (
RESULTS: Based on cortical thickness, 72% of the T– group were assigned to the HC group, 83% of the T+ group were assigned to the SCZ group, and 45% of the BP group were classified as belonging to the SCZ group, suggesting high specificity of this measurement in predicting brain-related phenotypes. Shared brain-related phenotypes between SCZ and T+ individuals were found for cortical thickness only. Finally, a classification accuracy of 73% was achieved when directly comparing the pattern of cortical thickness of T+ and T– individuals.
CONCLUSION: Together, the results of this study suggest that the
FUNDING: This work was supported by the National Health Service Research Scotland, the Scottish Translational Medicine Research Collaboration, the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), The Wellcome Trust, the National Institute of Health Research (NIHR), and Pfizer.
Orla M. Doyle, Catherine Bois, Pippa Thomson, Liana Romaniuk, Brandon Whitcher, Steven C.R. Williams, Federico E. Turkheimer, Hreinn Stefansson, Andrew M. McIntosh, Mitul A. Mehta, Stephen M. Lawrie
Hereditary retinal degenerative diseases, such as retinitis pigmentosa (RP), are characterized by the progressive loss of rod photoreceptors followed by loss of cones. While retinal gene therapy clinical trials demonstrated temporary improvement in visual function, this approach has yet to achieve sustained functional and anatomical rescue after disease onset in patients. The lack of sustained benefit could be due to insufficient transduction efficiency of viral vectors (“too little”) and/or because the disease is too advanced (“too late”) at the time therapy is initiated. Here, we tested the latter hypothesis and developed a mouse RP model that permits restoration of the mutant gene in all diseased photoreceptor cells, thereby ensuring sufficient transduction efficiency. We then treated mice at early, mid, or late disease stages. At all 3 time points, degeneration was halted and function was rescued for at least 1 year. Not only do our results demonstrate that gene therapy effectively preserves function after the onset of degeneration, our study also demonstrates that there is a broad therapeutic time window. Moreover, these results suggest that RP patients are treatable, despite most being diagnosed after substantial photoreceptor loss, and that gene therapy research must focus on improving transduction efficiency to maximize clinical impact.
Susanne F. Koch, Yi-Ting Tsai, Jimmy K. Duong, Wen-Hsuan Wu, Chun-Wei Hsu, Wei-Pu Wu, Luis Bonet-Ponce, Chyuan-Sheng Lin, Stephen H. Tsang
Induced pluripotent stem cell–derived (iPS-derived) neural precursor cells may represent the ideal autologous cell source for cell-based therapy to promote remyelination and neuroprotection in myelin diseases. So far, the therapeutic potential of reprogrammed cells has been evaluated in neonatal demyelinating models. However, the repair efficacy and safety of these cells has not been well addressed in the demyelinated adult CNS, which has decreased cell plasticity and scarring. Moreover, it is not clear if these induced pluripotent–derived cells have the same reparative capacity as physiologically committed CNS-derived precursors. Here, we performed a side-by-side comparison of CNS-derived and skin-derived neural precursors in culture and following engraftment in murine models of adult spinal cord demyelination. Grafted induced neural precursors exhibited a high capacity for survival, safe integration, migration, and timely differentiation into mature bona fide oligodendrocytes. Moreover, grafted skin–derived neural precursors generated compact myelin around host axons and restored nodes of Ranvier and conduction velocity as efficiently as CNS-derived precursors while outcompeting endogenous cells. Together, these results provide important insights into the biology of reprogrammed cells in adult demyelinating conditions and support use of these cells for regenerative biomedicine of myelin diseases that affect the adult CNS.
Sabah Mozafari, Cecilia Laterza, Delphine Roussel, Corinne Bachelin, Antoine Marteyn, Cyrille Deboux, Gianvito Martino, Anne Baron-Van Evercooren
Aging and increased amyloid burden are major risk factors for cognitive diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Effective therapies for these diseases are lacking. Here, we evaluated mouse models of age-associated memory impairment and amyloid deposition to study transcriptome and cell type–specific epigenome plasticity in the brain and peripheral organs. We determined that aging and amyloid pathology are associated with inflammation and impaired synaptic function in the hippocampal CA1 region as the result of epigenetic-dependent alterations in gene expression. In both amyloid and aging models, inflammation was associated with increased gene expression linked to a subset of transcription factors, while plasticity gene deregulation was differentially mediated. Amyloid pathology impaired histone acetylation and decreased expression of plasticity genes, while aging altered H4K12 acetylation–linked differential splicing at the intron-exon junction in neurons, but not nonneuronal cells. Furthermore, oral administration of the clinically approved histone deacetylase inhibitor vorinostat not only restored spatial memory, but also exerted antiinflammatory action and reinstated epigenetic balance and transcriptional homeostasis at the level of gene expression and exon usage. This study provides a systems-level investigation of transcriptome plasticity in the hippocampal CA1 region in aging and AD models and suggests that histone deacetylase inhibitors should be further explored as a cost-effective therapeutic strategy against age-associated cognitive decline.
Eva Benito, Hendrik Urbanke, Binu Ramachandran, Jonas Barth, Rashi Halder, Ankit Awasthi, Gaurav Jain, Vincenzo Capece, Susanne Burkhardt, Magdalena Navarro-Sala, Sankari Nagarajan, Anna-Lena Schütz, Steven A. Johnsen, Stefan Bonn, Reinhardt Lührmann, Camin Dean, André Fischer
Heterozygous mutations in the syntaxin-binding protein 1 (
Christopher Patzke, Yan Han, Jason Covy, Fei Yi, Stephan Maxeiner, Marius Wernig, Thomas C. Südhof
The X-linked neurological disorder Rett syndrome (RTT) presents with autistic features and is caused primarily by mutations in a transcriptional regulator, methyl CpG–binding protein 2 (MECP2). Current treatment options for RTT are limited to alleviating some neurological symptoms; hence, more effective therapeutic strategies are needed. We identified the protein tyrosine phosphatase PTP1B as a therapeutic candidate for treatment of RTT. We demonstrated that the
Navasona Krishnan, Keerthi Krishnan, Christopher R. Connors, Meng S. Choy, Rebecca Page, Wolfgang Peti, Linda Van Aelst, Stephen D. Shea, Nicholas K. Tonks
Neuropathic pain remains a pressing clinical problem. Here, we demonstrate that a local, intrathecal (i.t.) injection of bone marrow stromal cells (BMSCs) following lumbar puncture alleviates early- and late-phase neuropathic pain symptoms, such as allodynia and hyperalgesia, for several weeks in murine chronic constriction injury (CCI) and spared nerve injury models. Moreover, i.t. BMSCs reduced CCI-induced spontaneous pain and axonal injury of dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons and inhibited CCI-evoked neuroinflammation in DRGs and spinal cord tissues. BMSCs secreted TGF-β1 into the cerebrospinal fluid, and neutralization of TGF-β1, but not IL-10, reversed the analgesic effect of BMSCs. Conversely, i.t. administration of TGF-β1 potently inhibited neuropathic pain. TGF-β1 acted as a powerful neuromodulator and rapidly (within minutes) suppressed CCI-evoked spinal synaptic plasticity and DRG neuronal hyperexcitability via TGF-β receptor 1–mediated noncanonical signaling. Finally, nerve injury upregulated CXCL12 in lumbar L4–L6 DRGs, and this upregulation caused migration of i.t.-injected BMSCs to DRGs through the CXCL12 receptor CXCR4, which was expressed on BMSCs. BMSCs that migrated from the injection site survived at the border of DRGs for more than 2 months. Our findings support a paracrine mechanism by which i.t. BMSCs target CXCL12-producing DRGs to elicit neuroprotection and sustained neuropathic pain relief via TGF-β1 secretion.
Gang Chen, Chul-Kyu Park, Rou-Gang Xie, Ru-Rong Ji
Here we report inherited dysregulation of protein phosphatase activity as a cause of intellectual disability (ID). De novo missense mutations in 2 subunits of serine/threonine (Ser/Thr) protein phosphatase 2A (PP2A) were identified in 16 individuals with mild to severe ID, long-lasting hypotonia, epileptic susceptibility, frontal bossing, mild hypertelorism, and downslanting palpebral fissures. PP2A comprises catalytic (C), scaffolding (A), and regulatory (B) subunits that determine subcellular anchoring, substrate specificity, and physiological function. Ten patients had mutations within a highly conserved acidic loop of the
Gunnar Houge, Dorien Haesen, Lisenka E.L.M. Vissers, Sarju Mehta, Michael J. Parker, Michael Wright, Julie Vogt, Shane McKee, John L. Tolmie, Nuno Cordeiro, Tjitske Kleefstra, Marjolein H. Willemsen, Margot R.F. Reijnders, Siren Berland, Eli Hayman, Eli Lahat, Eva H. Brilstra, Koen L.I. van Gassen, Evelien Zonneveld-Huijssoon, Charlotte I. de Bie, Alexander Hoischen, Evan E. Eichler, Rita Holdhus, Vidar M. Steen, Stein Ove Døskeland, Matthew E Hurles, David R. FitzPatrick, the Deciphering Developmental Disorders (DDD) study, Veerle Janssens
Alcoholism, or alcohol use disorder, is a major public health concern that is a considerable risk factor for morbidity and disability; therefore, effective treatments are urgently needed. Here, we demonstrated that the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) antagonist mifepristone reduces alcohol intake in alcohol-dependent rats but not in nondependent animals. Both systemic delivery and direct administration into the central nucleus of the amygdala, a critical stress-related brain region, were sufficient to reduce alcohol consumption in dependent animals. We also tested the use of mifepristone in 56 alcohol-dependent human subjects as part of a double-blind clinical and laboratory-based study. Relative to placebo, individuals who received mifepristone (600 mg daily taken orally for 1 week) exhibited a substantial reduction in alcohol-cued craving in the laboratory, and naturalistic measures revealed reduced alcohol consumption during the 1-week treatment phase and 1-week post-treatment phase in mifepristone-treated individuals. Mifepristone was well tolerated and improved liver-function markers. Together, these results support further exploration of GR antagonism via mifepristone as a therapeutic strategy for alcoholism.
Leandro F. Vendruscolo, David Estey, Vivian Goodell, Lauren G. Macshane, Marian L. Logrip, Joel E. Schlosburg, M. Adrienne McGinn, Eva R. Zamora-Martinez, Joseph K. Belanoff, Hazel J. Hunt, Pietro P. Sanna, Olivier George, George F. Koob, Scott Edwards, Barbara J. Mason
Estrogen receptor–α (ERα) activity in the brain prevents obesity in both males and females. However, the ERα-expressing neural populations that regulate body weight remain to be fully elucidated. Here we showed that single-minded–1 (SIM1) neurons in the medial amygdala (MeA) express abundant levels of ERα. Specific deletion of the gene encoding ERα (
Pingwen Xu, Xuehong Cao, Yanlin He, Liangru Zhu, Yongjie Yang, Kenji Saito, Chunmei Wang, Xiaofeng Yan, Antentor Othrell Hinton Jr., Fang Zou, Hongfang Ding, Yan Xia, Chunling Yan, Gang Shu, San-Pin Wu, Bin Yang, Yuxin Feng, Deborah J. Clegg, Richard DeMarchi, Sohaib A. Khan, Sophia Y. Tsai, Francesco J. DeMayo, Qi Wu, Qingchun Tong, Yong Xu