Project description:The NEIL3 DNA glycosylase is a base excision repair enzyme that excises bulky base lesions from DNA. Although NEIL3 has been shown to unhook interstrand crosslinks (ICL) in Xenopus extracts, how NEIL3 participants in ICL repair in human cells and its corporation with the canonical Fanconi anemia (FA)/BRCA pathway remain unclear. Here we show that the NEIL3 and the FA/BRCA pathways are non-epistatic in psoralen-ICL repair. The NEIL3 pathway is the major pathway for repairing psoralen-ICL, and the FA/BRCA pathway is only activated when NEIL3 is not present. Mechanistically, NEIL3 is recruited to psoralen-ICL in a rapid, PARP-dependent manner. Importantly, the NEIL3 pathway repairs psoralen-ICLs without generating double-strand breaks (DSBs), unlike the FA/BRCA pathway. In addition, we found that the RUVBL1/2 complex physically interact with NEIL3 and function within the NEIL3 pathway in psoralen-ICL repair. Moreover, TRAIP is important for the recruitment of NEIL3 but not FANCD2, and knockdown of TRAIP promotes FA/BRCA pathway activation. Interestingly, TRAIP is non-epistatic with both NEIL3 and FA pathways in psoralen-ICL repair, suggesting that TRAIP may function upstream of the two pathways. Taken together, the NEIL3 pathway is the major pathway to repair psoralen-ICL through a unique DSB-free mechanism in human cells.
Project description:Twelve pairs of tumorous and peritumorous liver tissues (6 HBV- and 6 HCV-related HCC) that were obtained during the surgical liver resection of HCC patients were subjected to cDNA microarray analysis (Agilent Human Gene Expression v2 4x44K Microarray Kit) to screen the genes with expression levels that were different in the tumor than they were in the peritumorous tissue.
Project description:Next-generation sequencing (NGS) has revolutionized systems-based analysis of cellular pathways. The goals of this study are to compare NGS-derived liver cancer transcriptome profiling (RNA-seq) to quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT–PCR) methods and to evaluate protocols for optimal high-throughput data analysis.
Project description:Oxidative stress generating DNA damage has been shown to be a key characteristic in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). However, how it affects the pathogenesis of AD is not yet fully understood. NEIL3 is a DNA glycosylase initiating oxidative DNA repair and with a distinct expression pattern in proliferating cells. In brain, its function has been linked to hippocampal-dependent memory and to induction of neurogenesis after stroke and in prion disease. Here, we generated a novel AD mouse model deficient for Neil3 to study the impact of impaired oxidative base lesion repair on the pathogenesis of AD. Our results demonstrate an age-dependent decrease in amyloid-β (Aβ) plaque deposition in female NEIL3-deficient AD mice. Moreover, male NEIL3-deficient AD mice show reduced neural stem cell proliferation in the adult hippocampus and impaired working memory. These effects seem to be independent of DNA repair as both sexes show increased level of oxidative base lesions in the hippocampus upon loss of NEIL3. Thus, our findings suggest a sex-dependent role of NEIL3 in the progression of AD by altering cerebral Aβ accumulation and promoting adult hippocampal neurogenesis to maintain cognitive function.
Project description:Myocardial infarction (MI) triggers a reparative response involving fibroblast proliferation and differentiation driving extracellular matrix modulation necessary to form a stabilizing scar. Recently, it was shown that a genetic variant of the base excision repair enzyme endonuclease VIII-like 3 (NEIL3) was associated with increased risk of MI in humans. Here, we report elevated myocardial NEIL3 expression in heart failure patients and marked myocardial upregulation of Neil3 following MI in mice, especially in a fibroblast-enriched cell fraction. Neil3-/- mice showed increased mortality after MI compared to WT, caused by myocardial rupture. Neil3-/- hearts displayed enrichment of mutations in genes involved in mitogenesis of fibroblasts and transcriptome analysis revealed dysregulated fibrosis. Correspondingly, proliferation of vimentin+ and aSMA+ (myo)fibroblasts was increased in Neil3-/- hearts following MI. We propose that NEIL3 operates in genomic regions crucial for regulation of cardiac fibroblast proliferation and thereby controls extracellular matrix modulation after MI.
Project description:Myocardial infarction (MI) triggers a reparative response involving fibroblast proliferation and differentiation driving extracellular matrix modulation necessary to form a stabilizing scar. Recently, it was shown that a genetic variant of the base excision repair enzyme endonuclease VIII-like 3 (NEIL3) was associated with increased risk of MI in humans. Here, we report elevated myocardial NEIL3 expression in heart failure patients and marked myocardial upregulation of Neil3 following MI in mice, especially in a fibroblast-enriched cell fraction. Neil3-/-mice showed increased mortality after MI compared to WT, caused by myocardial rupture. Epigenomic analysis suggested dysregulated myofibroblast proliferation and differentiation in Neil3-/-hearts and several differentially expressed genes were downstream targets of differentially methylated/hydroxymethylated transcriptional regulators. Furthermore, proliferation of Vimentin+ and SMA+ (myo)fibroblasts was increased in Neil3 -/-hearts following MI. We propose that NEIL3-dependent modulation of epigenetic DNA methylation regulates cardiac fibroblast proliferation and thereby controls extracellular matrix modulation after MI.
Project description:We performed high-throughput RNA sequencing to characterize possible differences in the transcriptome of primary human aortic Vascular Smooth Muscle cells abrogated of NEIL3 mRNA via antisense oligonucleotides targeting NEIL3 exon 4, compared with control cells treated with a scramble version of the same antisense oligonucleotide
Project description:The bifunctional DNA glycosylases / AP lyases NEIL1 and NEIL2 excise oxidative base damages, but can also enhance the steady-state turnover of thymine DNA glycosylase (TDG) during oxidative DNA demethylation (Schomacher et al. 2016; doi:10.1038/nsmb.3151). The dual role of NEILs in antagonizing base damages and promoting epigenetic gene reactivation prompted us to investigate the consequences of NEIL deficiency during embryonic stem cell differentiation. To account for any possible functional redundancy in the NEIL family, all three paralogs NEIL1, NEIL2 and NEIL3 were inactivated using CRISPR/Cas9 in mouse embryonic stem cells.
Project description:CA1-specific brain tissue from the hippocampal formation was isolated at baseline (homecage condition) and after a spatial exploration paradigm ("open field") in wildtype and NEIL3-deficient mice. NEIL3 is a DNA glycosylase potentially involved in transcription regulation. RNA was extracted and sequenced. Subsequently, these results were correlated to an extracellular live recording of pyramidal cell activity ("place cell recording") in the same genotypes.