Cardiac fibrosis in the BACHD mouse model of Huntington’s Disease

ABSTRACT: Aims: While Huntington’s disease is classified as a neurological disorder, HD patients exhibit a high incidence of cardiovascular events leading to heart failure and death. In this study, we sought to better understand the cardiovascular phenotype of HD using the BACHD mouse model. Methods and Results: The age-related decline in cardiovascular function was assessed by echocardiograms, electrocardiograms, histological and microarray analysis. We found that structural and functional differences between WT and BACHD hearts start at 3mo of age and continue throughout life. The aged BACHD mice develop cardiac fibrosis. The BACHD mice exhibited adaptive physiological changes to chronic isoproterenol challenge; however, the treatment exacerbated fibrotic lesions in the heart. Gene expression analysis indicates a strong tilt toward apoptosis in the young mutant tissue as well as changes in genes involved in cellular metabolism and proliferation. With age, the number of genes with altered expression increased with the largest changes occurring in the cardiovascular disease and cellular metabolism clusters. Conclusions: The BACHD model of HD exhibit a number of changes in cardiovascular function that start early in the disease progress and may provide an explanation for the higher CV risk in HD. These changes are consistent with dysfunction in ANS regulation although the hearts did respond adaptively to β-adrenergic challenge. Gene expression pattern changes are subtle but suggests biomarkers focusing on apoptosis, metabolism, immune function are worth further exploration.

ORGANISM(S): Mus musculus

PROVIDER: GSE76593 | GEO | 2016/03/01

SECONDARY ACCESSION(S): PRJNA308110

REPOSITORIES: GEO