Project description:SLC6A20A is a proline and glycine transporter known to regulate glycine homeostasis and NMDA receptor (NMDAR) function in the brain. A previous study on Slc6a20a-haploinsufficient mice reported increases in ambient glycine levels and NMDA receptor-mediated synaptic transmission in the brain, but whether Slc6a20a deficiency leads to disease-related behavioral deficits in mice remains unknown. Here, we report that Slc6a20a heterozygous and homozygous mutant mice display gene dosage-dependent behavioral phenotypes in locomotor, repetitive behavioral, and fear memory domains. In addition, Slc6a20a heterozygous and homozygous mutant brains showed transcriptomic changes in synapse, ribosome, and mitochondria-related genes as well as autism, epilepsy, and neuron-related genes. These results suggest that Slc6a20a deletion leads to gene dosage-dependent behavioral deficits in mice and transcriptomic changes in genes associated with synapse, ribosome, mitochondria, ASD, epilepsy, and neurons
Project description:Shank3 is an abundant excitatory postsynaptic scaffolding proteins implicated in various neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders, including ASD, Phelan-McDermid syndrome, intellectual disability, and schizophrenia. Shank3-mutant mice with a homozygous deletion of exons 14-16 (Shank3-HM mice) show ASD-like behavioral deficits and altered synaptic and neuronal functions, but little is known about how different ages, brain regions, and gene dosages contribute to transcriptomic phenotypes in these mice. Here, we performed RNA-Seq-based transcriptomic analyses of the prefrontal cortex, hippocampus, and striatum in adult Shank3 heterozygous- and homozygous-mutant mice. In addition, juvenile and adult Shank3 homozygous-mutant forebrain transcriptomes were compared. Juvenile and adult forebrain transcriptomes from Shank3 homozygous-mutant mice showed the patterns that are opposite and similar to those observed in ASD: reverse-ASD and ASD-like patterns, respectively. Here, the juvenile reverse-ASD pattern involved synaptic gene upregulations and ribosomal and mitochondrial downregulations, whereas the adult ASD-like pattern involved opposite changes. Gene set enrichment analyses (GSEA) of brain regional transcripts in adult Shank3-HT and Shank3-HM mice revealed that the cortical, hippocampal, and striatal transcripts show distinctly altered biological functions and ASD-related/risk gene expressions. The cortex and striatum display ASD-like patterns whereas the hippocampus displays reverse-ASD patterns. The cortical ASD-like pattern more strongly involves ASD-risk genes whereas the striatal ASD-like pattern more strongly involves astrocyte/microglia genes. Shank3-HT and Shank3-HM transcripts in a given brain region display largely similar patterns in biological functions and ASD-related/risk gene expressions, suggestive of small gene dosage effects. These results suggest that heterozygous and homozygous Shank3 deletions in mice lead to age, brain region, and gene dosage-differential transcriptomic changes.
Project description:Shank2 is an abundant excitatory postsynaptic scaffolding protein implicated in neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism spectrum disorders (ASD), intellectual disability, developmental delay, and schizophrenia. Shank2-mutant mice with a homozygous deletion of exons 6 and 7 (Shank2-HM mice) show ASD-like behavioral deficits and altered synaptic functions, although little is known about how different brain regions contribute to Shank2-mutant phenotypes. Here we attempted transcriptomic analyses of the prefrontal cortex, hippocampus, and striatum in adult Shank2-heterozygous/HT and Shank2-homozygous/HM mice. The mutant cortex, hippocampus, and striatum displayed distinct sets of differentially expressed genes associated with neuronal and synaptic functions in a gene dosage-differential manner. Gene set enrichment analyses of cortical Shank2-HT transcripts revealed increased synaptic gene expression and transcriptomic changes that are opposite to those observed in ASD (reverse-ASD), whereas cortical Shank2-HM transcripts displayed decreased synaptic gene expression and ASD-like transcriptomic patterns. The hippocampal Shank2-HT transcripts displayed minimally altered synaptic gene expression and mixed ASD-like and reverse-ASD patterns, whereas the Shank2-HM-hippocampus showed increased synaptic gene expression and reverse-ASD patterns. The striatal Shank2-HT/HM transcriptomes were largely similar to the hippocampal transcriptomes, although the main changes were observed in cell-type-specific genes, unlike the hippocampal changes mainly involving ASD-related/risk genes. These results indicate that heterozygous and homozygous Shank2 deletions in mice lead to brain region- and gene dosage-differential transcriptomic changes.
Project description:Timecourse of gene expression changes in Drosophila SoxN homozygous mutant embryos compared with their heterozygous siblings, from stage 7 to 13 of embryonic development.
Project description:Shank2 is an abundant postsynaptic scaffolding protein known to regulate excitatory synaptic assembly and function and is implicated in autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Whereas patient Shank2 mutations in autistic individuals are heterozygous, Shank2 functions studied in mice have mainly relied on the results from homozygous mutant mice, largely because of relatively strong synaptic and behavioral phenotypes. Moreover, although synaptic changes at juvenile and adult Shank2-mutant mice seem to be largely similar, it remains unclear whether there are any age-dependent changes across these stages at the molecular level. To address these questions, we attempted RNA-Seq analyses of the transcriptomes in the prefrontal cortex of both heterozygous and homozygous Shank2-mutant mice lacking exons 6 and 7 at juvenile and adult stages. The results indicate that heterozygous, but not homozygous, juvenile Shank2-mutant mice show strong transcriptomic changes that promote excitatory synaptic transmission and suppress ASD-related gene expressions. In contrast, adult Shank2-mutant mice show largely similar and dosage-dependent transcriptomic changes.
Project description:Shank3 is an abundant excitatory postsynaptic scaffolding proteins implicated in various neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders, including ASD, Phelan-McDermid syndrome, intellectual disability, and schizophrenia. Shank3-mutant mice with a homozygous deletion of exons 14-16 (Shank3-HM mice) show ASD-like behavioral deficits and altered synaptic and neuronal functions, but little is known about how different ages, brain regions, and gene dosages contribute to transcriptomic phenotypes in these mice. Here, we performed RNA-Seq-based transcriptomic analyses of the prefrontal cortex, hippocampus, and striatum in adult Shank3 heterozygous- and homozygous-mutant mice. In addition, juvenile and adult Shank3 homozygous-mutant forebrain transcriptomes were compared. Juvenile and adult forebrain transcriptomes from Shank3 homozygous-mutant mice showed the patterns that are opposite and similar to those observed in ASD: reverse-ASD and ASD-like patterns, respectively. Here, the juvenile reverse-ASD pattern involved synaptic gene upregulations and ribosomal and mitochondrial downregulations, whereas the adult ASD-like pattern involved opposite changes. Gene set enrichment analyses (GSEA) of brain regional transcripts in adult Shank3-HT and Shank3-HM mice revealed that the cortical, hippocampal, and striatal transcripts show distinctly altered biological functions and ASD-related/risk gene expressions. The cortex and striatum display ASD-like patterns whereas the hippocampus displays reverse-ASD patterns. The cortical ASD-like pattern more strongly involves ASD-risk genes whereas the striatal ASD-like pattern more strongly involves astrocyte/microglia genes. Shank3-HT and Shank3-HM transcripts in a given brain region display largely similar patterns in biological functions and ASD-related/risk gene expressions, suggestive of small gene dosage effects. These results suggest that heterozygous and homozygous Shank3 deletions in mice lead to age, brain region, and gene dosage-differential transcriptomic changes.
Project description:Timecourse of gene expression changes in Drosophila SoxN homozygous mutant embryos compared with their heterozygous siblings, from stage 7 to 13 of embryonic development. Five time points: stage 7-8, stage 9, stage 10, stage 11 and stage 12-13. Four biological replicates per time point. Two conditions: SoxN homoxygous vs SoxN heterozygous mutant embryos.
Project description:An assessment of brain transcriptome differences between zebrafish siblings homozygous, heterozygous, and wild type for a loss-of-function mutation in mfn2.