Project description:Spinocerebellar ataxia type 6 (SCA6) is a dominantly inherited neurodegenerative disease characterized by loss of Purkinje cells in the cerebellum. SCA6 is caused by CAG trinucleotide repeat expansion in CACNA1A, which encodes Cav2.1, ?1A subunit of P/Q-type calcium channel. However, the pathogenic mechanism and effective therapeutic treatments are still unknown. Here we have succeeded in generation of differentiated Purkinje cells that carry the patient genes by combining disease-specific iPS cells and self-organizing culture technologies. SCA6-iPS cells derived Purkinje cells exhibited increased level of whole Cav2.1 protein while decreased level of its C-terminal fragment and downregulation of the transcriptional targets TAF1 and BTG1. We further demonstrate that SCA6-Purkinje cells exhibit thyroid hormone depletion-dependent degeneration, which can be suppressed by two compounds, thyroid releasing hormone and Riluzole. Thus we have constructed an in vitro disease model recapitulating both ontogenesis and pathogenesis. This model would be useful for pathogenic investigation and drug screening. Examination of mRNA profile in 1 ES cell line, two healthy donnor-derived iPS cell lines, three case-derived iPS cell lines and 1 normal dermal fibroblasts.
Project description:Spinocerebellar ataxia type 6 (SCA6) is a dominantly inherited neurodegenerative disease characterized by loss of Purkinje cells in the cerebellum. It is known to be caused by CAG trinucleotide repeat expansion in CACNA1A, the gene that encodes Cav2.1, α1A subunit of P/Q-type calcium channel. However, the pathogenic mechanism and effective therapeutic treatments are still unknown. Here we have succeeded in generation of mature Purkinje cells that carry the patient genes by combining patient-derived iPS cell and self-organizing culture technologies. Patient-derived Purkinje cells exhibited upregulation of whole Cav2.1 protein while downregulation of its C-terminal fragment and the transcriptional targets TAF1 and BTG1. We further demonstrate that patient Purkinje cells exhibit thyroid hormone depletion-dependent degeneration, which can be suppressed by two compounds, thyroid releasing hormone and Riluzole. Thus we have constructed an in vitro disease model recapitulating both ontogenesis and pathogenesis. This model would be useful for pathogenic investigation and drug screening
Project description:Spinocerebellar ataxia type 6 (SCA6) is a dominantly inherited neurodegenerative disease characterized by loss of Purkinje cells in the cerebellum. SCA6 is caused by CAG trinucleotide repeat expansion in CACNA1A, which encodes Cav2.1, α1A subunit of P/Q-type calcium channel. However, the pathogenic mechanism and effective therapeutic treatments are still unknown. Here we have succeeded in generation of differentiated Purkinje cells that carry the patient genes by combining disease-specific iPS cells and self-organizing culture technologies. SCA6-iPS cells derived Purkinje cells exhibited increased level of whole Cav2.1 protein while decreased level of its C-terminal fragment and downregulation of the transcriptional targets TAF1 and BTG1. We further demonstrate that SCA6-Purkinje cells exhibit thyroid hormone depletion-dependent degeneration, which can be suppressed by two compounds, thyroid releasing hormone and Riluzole. Thus we have constructed an in vitro disease model recapitulating both ontogenesis and pathogenesis. This model would be useful for pathogenic investigation and drug screening.
Project description:Purpose: The goals of this study were to identify the molecular alterations in the SCA1 inferior olive, and determine whether these changes are found in other affected tissues. Methods: mRNA profiling was conducted in two different SCA1 mouse models (Atxn1 154Q/2Q KI and ATXN1-82Q Tg), in two different affected tisues (inferior olive and cerebellum) during early disease initiation and progression (5 week and 12 week time-points). All analyses were conducted relative to appropriate wild-type controls. TopHat2 v2.1.0 was utilized to align reads to the mouse reference genome (mm10) before quantification and differential expression analysis with Cufflinks v2.2.1. Normalized expression values were generated using Cuffnorm. Results: Differentially regulated genes identified in the SCA1 inferior olive segregated into several enriched biological pathways, including the Defense Response at 12 weeks of age. Our study demonstrates that vulnerable tissues in SCA1 are not uniform in their gene expression changes, and express discrete and commonly enriched biological pathways. In addition, we found that brain region-specific differences occur early in disease initiation and progression at 5 weeks of age. Conclusions: The findings from this study suggest that different mechanisms of neurodegeneration are at work in the SCA1 inferior olive and cerebellum.