Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Characterization of Detergent-Insoluble Proteins in ALS Indicates a Causal Link between Nitrative Stress and Aggregation in Pathogenesis

2009; Public Library of Science; Volume: 4; Issue: 12 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1371/journal.pone.0008130

1932-6203

Manuela Basso, Samengo Giuseppina, Giovanni Nardo, Tania Massignan, Giuseppina D’Alessandro, Silvia Tartari, L Cantoni, Marianna Marino, Cristina Cheroni, Silvia De Biasi, Maria Teresa Giordana, Michael J. Strong, Álvaro G. Estévez, Mario Salmona, Caterina Bendotti, Valentina Bonetto,

Neurological diseases and metabolism

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a progressive and fatal motor neuron disease, and protein aggregation has been proposed as a possible pathogenetic mechanism. However, the aggregate protein constituents are poorly characterized so knowledge on the role of aggregation in pathogenesis is limited.We carried out a proteomic analysis of the protein composition of the insoluble fraction, as a model of protein aggregates, from familial ALS (fALS) mouse model at different disease stages. We identified several proteins enriched in the detergent-insoluble fraction already at a preclinical stage, including intermediate filaments, chaperones and mitochondrial proteins. Aconitase, HSC70 and cyclophilin A were also significantly enriched in the insoluble fraction of spinal cords of ALS patients. Moreover, we found that the majority of proteins in mice and HSP90 in patients were tyrosine-nitrated. We therefore investigated the role of nitrative stress in aggregate formation in fALS-like murine motor neuron-neuroblastoma (NSC-34) cell lines. By inhibiting nitric oxide synthesis the amount of insoluble proteins, particularly aconitase, HSC70, cyclophilin A and SOD1 can be substantially reduced.Analysis of the insoluble fractions from cellular/mouse models and human tissues revealed novel aggregation-prone proteins and suggests that nitrative stress contribute to protein aggregate formation in ALS.