Project description:Alcohol use disorder (AUD) affects transcriptomic, epigenetic and proteomic expression in several organs including the brain. Multi-omic analyses of the brain from individuals with AUD to date lack a comprehensive analysis of protein alterations in the multiple brain regions that underlie neuroadaptations occurring in AUD. We performed quantitative proteomic analysis using liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) analysis of human post-mortem tissue from brain regions that play a key role in the development and maintenance of AUD: amygdala (AMG), hippocampus (HIPP), hypothalamus (HYP), nucleus accumbens (NAc), prefrontal cortex (PFC) and ventral tegmental area (VTA). Brain tissues analyzed were from individuals with AUD (n = 11) and matched controls (n = 16).
Project description:Emerging research highlights the gut microbiota's critical role in modulating brain activity via the gut-brain axis. This study explores whether targeted gastrointestinal irradiation induces abscopal effects on the brain proteome, revealing microbiota-mediated neurobiological changes. Male Sinclair minipigs were randomized to receive either sham treatment (n=6) or 8 Gy lower hemibody (gut-targeted) irradiation (n=5). Over 14 days, rectal swabs were collected to monitor microbiota dynamics, followed by frontal cortex proteomic analysis. Irradiation altered gut microbiota composition, notably reducing Chlamydiae and Firmicutes phyla, while increasing Coriobacteriaceae and Acinetobacter. Proteomic analysis identified 75 differentially abundant proteins in the frontal cortex, including a significant decrease in pannexin-1 (PANX1), suggesting modulation of the NLRP3 inflammasome pathway. Functional enrichment analysis revealed immune and neurotransmission-related changes linked to microbial shifts. These results demonstrate that gut-targeted radiation can remotely affect brain protein expression, emphasizing the microbiota's role in neuroimmune regulation and pointing to novel therapeutic opportunities in gut-brain axis disorders.
Project description:Hypoxic ischemic brain damage (HIBD) is the primary cause of neurological deficits in neonates, leading to long-term cognitive impairment. Recent studies have demonstrated that gut microbiota plays a crucial role in the development of cognitive impairment after brain injury, known as the microbiota-gut-brain axis.
Project description:Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is a life-threatening disease characterized by compulsive drinking, cognitive deficits, and social impairment that continue despite negative consequences, which are driven by dysfunction of cortical areas, such as the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), that normally balances decisions related to reward and risk. In this study, proteomics and machine learning analysis of post-mortem OFC brain samples collected from individuals with AUD revealed dysregulation of presynaptic (e.g., AP2A1) and mitochondrial proteins that predicted the occurrence and severity of AUD. Alcohol-sensitive OFC proteins also mapped to abnormal social behaviors and interactions. Validation using reverse genetics, we found that prefrontal Ap2a1 regulates alcohol drinking in genetically diverse mouse strains. Furthermore, we demonstrated sexual dimorphism in human OFC proteins that regulate extracellular matrix structure and signaling. Together, these findings highlight the impact of excessive alcohol consumption on the human OFC proteome and identify important cross-species cortical mechanisms underlying AUD.
Project description:Chronic alcohol consumption may alter miRNA transcriptome profiles in reward-related brain regions. Given that miRNAs can regulate the expression of their target coding genes (or mRNAs) at the post-transcriptional level, alcohol-induced miRNA expression change may influence the expression of their targets mRNAs that are involved in alcohol use disorder (AUD)-related pathways, leading to increased risk of AUD. We used the Affymetrix GeneChip™ miRNA 4.0 Array to map miRNA transcriptome profiles in six reward-related regions of postmortem brains of AUD and control subjects and identified differentially expressed miRNAs.
Project description:Brain metastases (BrMs) are the most common brain tumors in patients and are associated with poor prognosis. Investigating the systemic and environmental factors regulating BrM biology represents an important strategy to develop effective treatments. Towards this goal, we explored the contribution of the gut microbiome to BrM development by using in vivo breast-BrM models under germ-free conditions or antibiotic treatment. This revealed a detrimental role of gut microbiota in fostering BrM initiation. We thus evaluated the impact of antibiotics and BrM outgrowth on the gut-brain axis. We found the bacterial genus Alistipes was differentially present under antibiotic treatment and BrM progression. In parallel, we quantified circulating metabolites, revealing kynurenic acid as a differentially abundant molecule which impaired the interaction between cancer cells and the brain vasculature in ex vivo functional assays. Together, these results illuminate the potential role of gut microbiota in modulating breast-BrM via the gut-to-brain axis.
Project description:A phylogenetic microarray targeting 66 families described in the human gut microbiota has been developped aud used to monitor the gut microbiota's structure and diversity. The microarray format provided by Agilent and used in this study is 8x15K. A study with a total of 4 chips was realized.