Exploring therapeutic strategies for infantile neuronal axonal dystrophy (INAD/PARK14)

  1. Guang Lin
  2. Burak Tepe
  3. Geoff McGrane
  4. Regine C Tipon
  5. Gist Croft
  6. Leena Panwala
  7. Amanda Hope
  8. Agnes JH Liang
  9. Zhongyuan Zuo
  10. Seul Kee Byeon
  11. Lily Wang
  12. Akhilesh Pandey
  13. Hugo J Bellen  Is a corresponding author
  1. Baylor College of Medicine, United States
  2. New York Stem Cell Foundation, United States
  3. INADcure Foundation, United States
  4. Mayo Clinic, United States

Abstract

Infantile Neuroaxonal Dystrophy (INAD) is caused by recessive variants in PLA2G6 and is a lethal pediatric neurodegenerative disorder. Loss of the Drosophila homolog of PLA2G6, leads to ceramide accumulation, lysosome expansion, and mitochondrial defects. Here, we report that retromer function, ceramide metabolism, the endolysosomal pathway, and mitochondrial morphology are affected in INAD patient-derived neurons. We show that in INAD mouse models the same features are affected in Purkinje cells, arguing that the neuropathological mechanisms are evolutionary conserved and that these features can be used as biomarkers. We tested 20 drugs that target these pathways and found that Ambroxol, Desipramine, Azoramide, and Genistein alleviate neurodegenerative phenotypes in INAD flies and INAD patient-derived NPCs. We also develop an AAV-based gene therapy approach that delays neurodegeneration and prolongs lifespan in an INAD mouse model.

Data availability

All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in the manuscript and supporting file; Source Data files have been provided for Figures 1, 3, 4 and Suppl. Figure 1.

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Guang Lin

    Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-5594-3397
  2. Burak Tepe

    Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0003-4371-2502
  3. Geoff McGrane

    New York Stem Cell Foundation, New York, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  4. Regine C Tipon

    New York Stem Cell Foundation, New York, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-5473-7353
  5. Gist Croft

    New York Stem Cell Foundation, New York, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  6. Leena Panwala

    INADcure Foundation, New Jersey, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  7. Amanda Hope

    INADcure Foundation, New Jersey, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  8. Agnes JH Liang

    Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  9. Zhongyuan Zuo

    Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  10. Seul Kee Byeon

    Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  11. Lily Wang

    Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  12. Akhilesh Pandey

    Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, United States
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-9943-6127
  13. Hugo J Bellen

    Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, United States
    For correspondence
    hbellen@bcm.edu
    Competing interests
    Hugo J Bellen, Reviewing editor, eLife.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-5992-5989

Funding

Baylor College of Medicine (P50HD103555)

  • Hugo J Bellen

Huffington Foundation

  • Hugo J Bellen

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Ethics

Animal experimentation: All experimental animals were treated in compliance with the United States Department of Health and Human Services and the Baylor College of Medicine IACUC guidelines. Protocol (AN-5596).

Copyright

© 2023, Lin et al.

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

Metrics

  • 2,265
    views
  • 345
    downloads
  • 8
    citations

Views, downloads and citations are aggregated across all versions of this paper published by eLife.

Download links

A two-part list of links to download the article, or parts of the article, in various formats.

Downloads (link to download the article as PDF)

Open citations (links to open the citations from this article in various online reference manager services)

Cite this article (links to download the citations from this article in formats compatible with various reference manager tools)

  1. Guang Lin
  2. Burak Tepe
  3. Geoff McGrane
  4. Regine C Tipon
  5. Gist Croft
  6. Leena Panwala
  7. Amanda Hope
  8. Agnes JH Liang
  9. Zhongyuan Zuo
  10. Seul Kee Byeon
  11. Lily Wang
  12. Akhilesh Pandey
  13. Hugo J Bellen
(2023)
Exploring therapeutic strategies for infantile neuronal axonal dystrophy (INAD/PARK14)
eLife 12:e82555.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.82555

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.82555

Further reading

    1. Neuroscience
    Rituja S Bisen, Fathima Mukthar Iqbal ... Jan M Ache
    Research Article

    Insulin plays a key role in metabolic homeostasis. Drosophila insulin-producing cells (IPCs) are functional analogues of mammalian pancreatic beta cells and release insulin directly into circulation. To investigate the in vivo dynamics of IPC activity, we quantified the effects of nutritional and internal state changes on IPCs using electrophysiological recordings. We found that the nutritional state strongly modulates IPC activity. IPC activity decreased with increasing periods of starvation. Refeeding flies with glucose or fructose, two nutritive sugars, significantly increased IPC activity, whereas non-nutritive sugars had no effect. In contrast to feeding, glucose perfusion did not affect IPC activity. This was reminiscent of the mammalian incretin effect, where glucose ingestion drives higher insulin release than intravenous application. Contrary to IPCs, Diuretic hormone 44-expressing neurons in the pars intercerebralis (DH44PINs) responded to glucose perfusion. Functional connectivity experiments demonstrated that these DH44PINs do not affect IPC activity, while other DH44Ns inhibit them. Hence, populations of autonomously and systemically sugar-sensing neurons work in parallel to maintain metabolic homeostasis. Accordingly, activating IPCs had a small, satiety-like effect on food-searching behavior and reduced starvation-induced hyperactivity, whereas activating DH44Ns strongly increased hyperactivity. Taken together, we demonstrate that IPCs and DH44Ns are an integral part of a modulatory network that orchestrates glucose homeostasis and adaptive behavior in response to shifts in the metabolic state.

    1. Neuroscience
    Yichun Shuai, Megan Sammons ... Yoshinori Aso
    Tools and Resources

    The mushroom body (MB) is the center for associative learning in insects. In Drosophila, intersectional split-GAL4 drivers and electron microscopy (EM) connectomes have laid the foundation for precise interrogation of the MB neural circuits. However, investigation of many cell types upstream and downstream of the MB has been hindered due to lack of specific driver lines. Here we describe a new collection of over 800 split-GAL4 and split-LexA drivers that cover approximately 300 cell types, including sugar sensory neurons, putative nociceptive ascending neurons, olfactory and thermo-/hygro-sensory projection neurons, interneurons connected with the MB-extrinsic neurons, and various other cell types. We characterized activation phenotypes for a subset of these lines and identified a sugar sensory neuron line most suitable for reward substitution. Leveraging the thousands of confocal microscopy images associated with the collection, we analyzed neuronal morphological stereotypy and discovered that one set of mushroom body output neurons, MBON08/MBON09, exhibits striking individuality and asymmetry across animals. In conjunction with the EM connectome maps, the driver lines reported here offer a powerful resource for functional dissection of neural circuits for associative learning in adult Drosophila.