scholarly journals Functional roles for the striatal-enriched transcription factor, Bcl11b, in the control of striatal gene expression and transcriptional dysregulation in Huntington's disease

2008 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 298-308 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paula A. Desplats ◽  
James R. Lambert ◽  
Elizabeth A. Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Transcription Factor ◽  
Huntington's Disease ◽  
Huntington’S Disease ◽  
Functional Roles ◽  
Transcriptional Dysregulation

scholarly journals Early epigenomic and transcriptional changes reveal Elk-1 transcription factor as a therapeutic target in Huntington’s disease

2019 ◽  
Vol 116 (49) ◽  
pp. 24840-24851 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ferah Yildirim ◽  
Christopher W. Ng ◽  
Vincent Kappes ◽  
Tobias Ehrenberger ◽  
Siobhan K. Rigby ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Transcription Factor ◽  
Huntington's Disease ◽  
Huntington’S Disease ◽  
Neurodegenerative Disorder ◽  
Disease Onset ◽  
Beneficial Effects ◽  
Transcriptional Dysregulation ◽  
Clinical Onset ◽  
Transcriptional Changes ◽  
Chromatin Profiling

Huntington’s disease (HD) is a chronic neurodegenerative disorder characterized by a late clinical onset despite ubiquitous expression of the mutant Huntingtin gene (HTT) from birth. Transcriptional dysregulation is a pivotal feature of HD. Yet, the genes that are altered in the prodromal period and their regulators, which present opportunities for therapeutic intervention, remain to be elucidated. Using transcriptional and chromatin profiling, we found aberrant transcription and changes in histone H3K27acetylation in the striatum of R6/1 mice during the presymptomatic disease stages. Integrating these data, we identified the Elk-1 transcription factor as a candidate regulator of prodromal changes in HD. Exogenous expression of Elk-1 exerted beneficial effects in a primary striatal cell culture model of HD, and adeno-associated virus-mediated Elk-1 overexpression alleviated transcriptional dysregulation in R6/1 mice. Collectively, our work demonstrates that aberrant gene expression precedes overt disease onset in HD, identifies the Elk-1 transcription factor as a key regulator linked to early epigenetic and transcriptional changes in HD, and presents evidence for Elk-1 as a target for alleviating molecular pathology in HD.

Transcriptional dysregulation of coding and non-coding genes in cellular models of Huntington's disease

2009 ◽  
Vol 37 (6) ◽  
pp. 1270-1275 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angela Bithell ◽  
Rory Johnson ◽  
Noel J. Buckley
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Transcription Factor ◽  
Huntington's Disease ◽  
Huntington’S Disease ◽  
Target Genes ◽  
Neurodegenerative Disorder ◽  
Late Onset ◽  
Cag Repeat ◽  
Contributory Factor ◽  
Cellular Models

HD (Huntington's disease) is a late onset heritable neurodegenerative disorder that is characterized by neuronal dysfunction and death, particularly in the cerebral cortex and medium spiny neurons of the striatum. This is followed by progressive chorea, dementia and emotional dysfunction, eventually resulting in death. HD is caused by an expanded CAG repeat in the first exon of the HD gene that results in an abnormally elongated polyQ (polyglutamine) tract in its protein product, Htt (Huntingtin). Wild-type Htt is largely cytoplasmic; however, in HD, proteolytic N-terminal fragments of Htt form insoluble deposits in both the cytoplasm and nucleus, provoking the idea that mutHtt (mutant Htt) causes transcriptional dysfunction. While a number of specific transcription factors and co-factors have been proposed as mediators of mutHtt toxicity, the causal relationship between these Htt/transcription factor interactions and HD pathology remains unknown. Previous work has highlighted REST [RE1 (repressor element 1)-silencing transcription factor] as one such transcription factor. REST is a master regulator of neuronal genes, repressing their expression. Many of its direct target genes are known or suspected to have a role in HD pathogenesis, including BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor). Recent evidence has also shown that REST regulates transcription of regulatory miRNAs (microRNAs), many of which are known to regulate neuronal gene expression and are dysregulated in HD. Thus repression of miRNAs constitutes a second, indirect mechanism by which REST can alter the neuronal transcriptome in HD. We will describe the evidence that disruption to the REST regulon brought about by a loss of interaction between REST and mutHtt may be a key contributory factor in the widespread dysregulation of gene expression in HD.

scholarly journals A Systematic Review of Transcriptional Dysregulation in Huntington’s Disease Studied by RNA Sequencing

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bimala Malla ◽  
Xuanzong Guo ◽  
Gökçe Senger ◽  
Zoi Chasapopoulou ◽  
Ferah Yildirim
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Systematic Review ◽  
Huntington's Disease ◽  
Huntington’S Disease ◽  
Rna Sequencing ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Medium Spiny Neurons ◽  
Rna Seq ◽  
Transcriptional Dysregulation ◽  
Spiny Neurons

Huntington’s disease (HD) is a chronic neurodegenerative disorder caused by an expansion of polyglutamine repeats in exon 1 of the Huntingtin gene. Transcriptional dysregulation accompanied by epigenetic alterations is an early and central disease mechanism in HD yet, the exact mechanisms and regulators, and their associated gene expression programs remain incompletely understood. This systematic review investigates genome-wide transcriptional studies that were conducted using RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) technology in HD patients and models. The review protocol was registered at the Open Science Framework (OSF). The biomedical literature and gene expression databases, PubMed and NCBI BioProject, Array Express, European Nucleotide Archive (ENA), European Genome-Phenome Archive (EGA), respectively, were searched using the defined terms specified in the protocol following the PRISMA guidelines. We conducted a complete literature and database search to retrieve all RNA-seq-based gene expression studies in HD published until August 2020, retrieving 288 articles and 237 datasets from PubMed and the databases, respectively. A total of 27 studies meeting the eligibility criteria were included in this review. Collectively, comparative analysis of the datasets revealed frequent genes that are consistently dysregulated in HD. In postmortem brains from HD patients, DNAJB1, HSPA1B and HSPB1 genes were commonly upregulated across all brain regions and cell types except for medium spiny neurons (MSNs) at symptomatic disease stage, and HSPH1 and SAT1 genes were altered in expression in all symptomatic brain datasets, indicating early and sustained changes in the expression of genes related to heat shock response as well as response to misfolded proteins. Specifically in indirect pathway medium spiny neurons (iMSNs), mitochondria related genes were among the top uniquely dysregulated genes. Interestingly, blood from HD patients showed commonly differentially expressed genes with a number of brain regions and cells, with the highest number of overlapping genes with MSNs and BA9 region at symptomatic stage. We also found the differential expression and predicted altered activity of a set of transcription factors and epigenetic regulators, including BCL6, EGR1, FOSL2 and CREBBP, HDAC1, KDM4C, respectively, which may underlie the observed transcriptional changes in HD. Altogether, our work provides a complete overview of the transcriptional studies in HD, and by data synthesis, reveals a number of common and unique gene expression and regulatory changes across different cell and tissue types in HD. These changes could elucidate new insights into molecular mechanisms of differential vulnerability in HD.Systematic Review Registration:https://osf.io/pm3wq

scholarly journals Altered Huntingtin-Chromatin Interactions Predict Transcriptional and Epigenetic Changes in Huntington’s Disease

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jocelynn R Pearl ◽  
Amol C Shetty ◽  
Jeffrey P Cantle ◽  
Dani E Bergey ◽  
Robert M. Bragg ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Huntington's Disease ◽  
Huntington’S Disease ◽  
Chromatin Immunoprecipitation ◽  
Epigenetic Alterations ◽  
Direct Role ◽  
Transcriptional Dysregulation ◽  
Chromatin Interactions ◽  
Histone 3 ◽  
Regulated Gene Expression

SummaryProgressive striatal gene expression changes and epigenetic alterations are a prominent feature of Huntington’s disease (HD), but direct relationships between the huntingtin (HTT) protein and chromatin remain poorly described. Here, using chromatin immunoprecipitation and sequencing (ChIP-seq), we show that HTT reproducibly occupies specific locations in the mouse genome, including thousands of genomic loci that are differentially occupied in striatal tissue from a knock-in mouse model of HD (B6.HttQ111/+) versus wildtype controls. ChIP-seq of histone modifications, generated in parallel, revealed genotype-specific colocalization of HTT with trimethylation of histone 3 lysine 27 (H3K27me3), a repressive chromatin mark. Near genes that are differentially regulated in HD, greater HTT occupancy in HttQ111/+ vs. wildtype mice predicted increased H3K27me3, reduced histone 3 lysine 4 (H3K4me3), a marker of poised and active promoters, and down-regulated gene expression. Altered huntingtin-chromatin interactions may therefore play a direct role in driving transcriptional dysregulation in HD.

scholarly journals RNA Sequencing of Human Peripheral Blood Cells Indicates Upregulation of Immune-Related Genes in Huntington's Disease

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miguel A. Andrade-Navarro ◽  
Katja Mühlenberg ◽  
Eike J. Spruth ◽  
Nancy Mah ◽  
Adrián González-López ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Huntington's Disease ◽  
Huntington’S Disease ◽  
Peripheral Blood ◽  
Blood Cells ◽  
Trinucleotide Repeat ◽  
Neurodegenerative Disorder ◽  
Gene Expression Signature ◽  
Interferon Response ◽  
Peripheral Blood Cells

Huntington's disease (HD) is an autosomal dominantly inherited neurodegenerative disorder caused by a trinucleotide repeat expansion in the Huntingtin gene. As disease-modifying therapies for HD are being developed, peripheral blood cells may be used to indicate disease progression and to monitor treatment response. In order to investigate whether gene expression changes can be found in the blood of individuals with HD that distinguish them from healthy controls, we performed transcriptome analysis by next-generation sequencing (RNA-seq). We detected a gene expression signature consistent with dysregulation of immune-related functions and inflammatory response in peripheral blood from HD cases vs. controls, including induction of the interferon response genes, IFITM3, IFI6 and IRF7. Our results suggest that it is possible to detect gene expression changes in blood samples from individuals with HD, which may reflect the immune pathology associated with the disease.

scholarly journals The Effects of Selective Inhibition of Histone Deacetylase 1 and 3 in Huntington’s Disease Mice

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katharina Hecklau ◽  
Susanne Mueller ◽  
Stefan Paul Koch ◽  
Mustafa Hussain Mehkary ◽  
Busra Kilic ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Huntington's Disease ◽  
Huntington’S Disease ◽  
Selective Inhibition ◽  
Skill Learning ◽  
Disease Stage ◽  
Therapeutic Effects ◽  
Modest Improvement ◽  
Symptomatic Disease ◽  
Histone Deacetylase 1 ◽  
Transcriptional Dysregulation

Huntington’s disease (HD) is an autosomal dominant neurodegenerative disease characterized by a late clinical onset of psychiatric, cognitive, and motor symptoms. Transcriptional dysregulation is an early and central disease mechanism which is accompanied by epigenetic alterations in HD. Previous studies demonstrated that targeting transcriptional changes by inhibition of histone deacetylases (HDACs), especially the class I HDACs, provides therapeutic effects. Yet, their exact mechanisms of action and the features of HD pathology, on which these inhibitors act remain to be elucidated. Here, using transcriptional profiling, we found that selective inhibition of HDAC1 and HDAC3 by RGFP109 alleviated transcriptional dysregulation of a number of genes, including the transcription factor genes Neurod2 and Nr4a2, and gene sets and programs, especially those that are associated to insulin-like growth factor pathway, in the striatum of R6/1 mice. RGFP109 treatment led to a modest improvement of the motor skill learning and coordination deficit on the RotaRod test, while it did not alter the locomotor and anxiety-like phenotypes in R6/1 animals. We also found, by volumetric MRI, a widespread brain atrophy in the R6/1 mice at the symptomatic disease stage, on which RGFP109 showed no significant effects. Collectively, our combined work suggests that specific HDAC1 and HDAC3 inhibition may offer benefits for alleviating the motor phenotypic deficits and transcriptional dysregulation in HD.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document