Shaker-1 mutations reveal roles for myosin VIIA in both development and function of cochlear hair cells

Development ◽  
1998 ◽  
Vol 125 (4) ◽  
pp. 557-566 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Self ◽  
M. Mahony ◽  
J. Fleming ◽  
J. Walsh ◽  
S.D. Brown ◽  
...  

The mouse shaker-1 locus, Myo7a, encodes myosin VIIA and mutations in the orthologous gene in humans cause Usher syndrome type 1B or non-syndromic deafness. Myo7a is expressed very early in sensory hair cell development in the inner ear. We describe the effects of three mutations on cochlear hair cell development and function. In the Myo7a816SB and Myo7a6J mutants, stereocilia grow and form rows of graded heights as normal, but the bundles become progressively more disorganised. Most of these mutants show no gross electrophysiological responses, but some did show evidence of hair cell depolarisation despite the disorganisation of their bundles. In contrast, the original shaker-1 mutants, Myo7ash1, had normal early development of stereocilia bundles, but still showed abnormal cochlear responses. These findings suggest that myosin VIIA is required for normal stereocilia bundle organisation and has a role in the function of cochlear hair cells.

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Z. Jason Qian ◽  
Anthony J. Ricci

AbstractCurrent clinical interest lies in the relationship between hearing loss and cognitive impairment. Previous work demonstrated that noise exposure, a common cause of sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL), leads to cognitive impairments in mice. However, in noise-induced models, it is difficult to distinguish the effects of noise trauma from subsequent SNHL on central processes. Here, we use cochlear hair cell ablation to isolate the effects of SNHL. Cochlear hair cells were conditionally and selectively ablated in mature, transgenic mice where the human diphtheria toxin (DT) receptor was expressed behind the hair-cell specific Pou4f3 promoter. Due to higher Pou4f3 expression in cochlear hair cells than vestibular hair cells, administration of a low dose of DT caused profound SNHL without vestibular dysfunction and had no effect on wild-type (WT) littermates. Spatial learning/memory was assayed using an automated radial 8-arm maze (RAM), where mice were trained to find food rewards over a 14-day period. The number of working memory errors (WME) and reference memory errors (RME) per training day were recorded. All animals were injected with DT during P30–60 and underwent the RAM assay during P90–120. SNHL animals committed more WME and RME than WT animals, demonstrating that isolated SNHL affected cognitive function. Duration of SNHL (60 versus 90 days post DT injection) had no effect on RAM performance. However, younger age of acquired SNHL (DT on P30 versus P60) was associated with fewer WME. This describes the previously undocumented effect of isolated SNHL on cognitive processes that do not directly rely on auditory sensory input.


2015 ◽  
Vol 600 ◽  
pp. 164-170 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miaomiao Han ◽  
Dongzhen Yu ◽  
Qiang Song ◽  
Jiping Wang ◽  
Pin Dong ◽  
...  

2004 ◽  
Vol 91 (6) ◽  
pp. 2422-2428 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc D. Eisen ◽  
Maria Spassova ◽  
Thomas D. Parsons

Hearing requires the hair cell synapse to maintain notable temporal fidelity (≤1 ms) while sustaining neurotransmitter release for prolonged periods of time (minutes). Here we probed the properties and possible anatomical substrate of prolonged neurotransmitter release by using electrical measures of cell surface area as a proxy for neurotransmitter release to study hair cell exocytosis evoked by repetitive stimuli. We observed marked depression of exocytosis by chick tall hair cells. This exocytic depression cannot be explained by calcium current inactivation, presynaptic autoinhibition by metabotropic glutamate receptors, or postsynaptic receptor desensitization. Rather, cochlear hair cell exocytic depression resulted from the exhaustion of a functional vesicle pool. This releasable vesicle pool is large, totaling approximately 8,000 vesicles, and is nearly 10 times greater than the number of vesicles tethered to synaptic ribbons. Such a large functional pool suggests the recruitment of cytoplasmic vesicles to sustain exocytosis, important for maintaining prolonged, high rates of neural activity needed to encode sound.


2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clive P. Morgan ◽  
Hongyu Zhao ◽  
Meredith LeMasurier ◽  
Wei Xiong ◽  
Bifeng Pan ◽  
...  

AbstractThe hair-cell mechanotransduction channel remains unidentified. We tested whether four transient receptor channel (TRP) family members, TRPV5, TRPV6, TRPM6, and TRPM7, participated in transduction. Using cysteine-substitution mouse knock-ins and methanethiosulfonate reagents selective for those alleles, we found that inhibition of TRPV5 or TRPV6 had no effect on transduction in mouse cochlear hair cells. TRPM6 and TRPM7 each interacted with the tip-link component PCDH15 in cultured eukaryotic cells, which suggested they could participate in transduction. Cochlear hair cell transduction was insensitive to shRNA knockdown ofTrpm6orTrpm7, however, and was not affected by manipulations of Mg2+, which normally perturbs TRPM6 and TRPM7. To definitively examine the role of these two channels in transduction, we showed that deletion of either or both of their genes selectively in hair cells had no effect on auditory function. We suggest that TRPV5, TRPV6, TRPM6, and TRPM7 are unlikely to be the pore-forming subunit of the hair-cell transduction channel.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yingpeng Xu ◽  
Chen Sun ◽  
Chen Lu ◽  
Yaqing Liu ◽  
Ling Lu ◽  
...  

Abstract Cisplatin is a very effective anti-tumor drug; nonetheless, it can induce cochlear hair cell apoptosis and ototoxicity in large doses. WNT/β-catenin signaling is also closely related to aging, embryonic development, and apoptosis. We establish a cisplatin-induced HEI-OC1 auditory cells model. WNT/β-catenin was activated by GSK3 inhibitor Licl to detect the expression level of each component of the WNT pathway and BMI1. The expression of BMI1 in the hair cell line model of HEI-OC1 cells induced by cisplatin was significantly reduced, and cell apoptosis was significantly reduced by increasing the expression level of cell line BMI through activating WNT/β-catenin signaling. Activation of WNT/β-catenin signaling to increase BMI1 expression can reduce the apoptosis of cochlear hair cells induced by cisplatin. BMI1 also has a protective effect on the ototoxicity of cisplatin.


1989 ◽  
Vol 98 (6) ◽  
pp. 461-465 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard A. Chole ◽  
Maggie Chiu

LP/J inbred mice spontaneously develop bony lesions of the middle ear and otic capsule that are similar to those of human otosclerosis and tympanosclerosis. These mice also have progressive loss of hearing due to cochlear hair cell loss. The purpose of this study was to describe quantitatively the deterioration and loss of cochlear hair cells to serve as a basis for future experiments attempting to alter the course of this disorder. Cochleas from 37 LP/J inbred mice were examined by scanning electron microscopy. The stereocilia loss in the cochlea was evident as early as 15 weeks of age and progressed from the basal turn to the apex. Outer hair cells were affected more than inner hair cells. As outer hair cells deteriorated we observed fusion, bending, and breakage of stereocilia. There were no apparent differences in the mode of deterioration among the three rows of outer hair cells. Stereocilia fusion of inner hair cells occurred at an older age, and giant, elongated stereocilia were found in some of the animals.


Author(s):  
Qingxiu Yao ◽  
Hui Wang ◽  
Hengchao Chen ◽  
Zhuangzhuang Li ◽  
Yumeng Jiang ◽  
...  

AbstractHearing loss is the most common human sensory deficit. Hearing relies on stereocilia, inserted into the cuticular plate of hair cells (HCs), where they play an important role in the perception of sound and its transmission. Although numerous genes have been associated with hearing loss, the function of many hair cell genes has yet to be elucidated. Herein, we focused on nonerythroid spectrin αII (SPTAN1), abundant in the cuticular plate, surrounding the rootlets of stereocilia and along the plasma membrane. Interestingly, mice with HC-specific Sptan1 knockout exhibited rapid deafness, abnormal formation of stereocilia and cuticular plates, and loss of HCs from middle and apical turns of the cochlea during early postnatal stages. Additionally, Sptan1 deficiency led to the decreased spreading of House Ear Institute-Organ of Corti 1 cells, and induced abnormal formation of focal adhesions and integrin signaling in mouse HCs. Altogether, our findings highlight SPTAN1 as a critical molecule for HC stereocilia morphology and auditory function via regulation of focal adhesion signaling.


2012 ◽  
Vol 141 (1) ◽  
pp. 141-148 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kyunghee X. Kim ◽  
Robert Fettiplace

Vibration of the stereociliary bundles activates calcium-permeable mechanotransducer (MT) channels to initiate sound detection in cochlear hair cells. Different regions of the cochlea respond preferentially to different acoustic frequencies, with variation in the unitary conductance of the MT channels contributing to this tonotopic organization. Although the molecular identity of the MT channel remains uncertain, two members of the transmembrane channel–like family, Tmc1 and Tmc2, are crucial to hair cell mechanotransduction. We measured MT channel current amplitude and Ca2+ permeability along the cochlea’s longitudinal (tonotopic) axis during postnatal development of wild-type mice and mice lacking Tmc1 (Tmc1−/−) or Tmc2 (Tmc2−/−). In wild-type mice older than postnatal day (P) 4, MT current amplitude increased ∼1.5-fold from cochlear apex to base in outer hair cells (OHCs) but showed little change in inner hair cells (IHCs), a pattern apparent in mutant mice during the first postnatal week. After P7, the OHC MT current in Tmc1−/− (dn) mice declined to zero, consistent with their deafness phenotype. In wild-type mice before P6, the relative Ca2+ permeability, PCa, of the OHC MT channel decreased from cochlear apex to base. This gradient in PCa was not apparent in IHCs and disappeared after P7 in OHCs. In Tmc1−/− mice, PCa in basal OHCs was larger than that in wild-type mice (to equal that of apical OHCs), whereas in Tmc2−/−, PCa in apical and basal OHCs and IHCs was decreased compared with that in wild-type mice. We postulate that differences in Ca2+ permeability reflect different subunit compositions of the MT channel determined by expression of Tmc1 and Tmc2, with the latter conferring higher PCa in IHCs and immature apical OHCs. Changes in PCa with maturation are consistent with a developmental decrease in abundance of Tmc2 in OHCs but not in IHCs.


1997 ◽  
Vol 17 (24) ◽  
pp. 9506-9519 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. P. Richardson ◽  
A. Forge ◽  
C. J. Kros ◽  
J. Fleming ◽  
S. D. M. Brown ◽  
...  

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