Abstract
Spinocerebellar ataxia-1 (SCA1) is a late onset neurodegenerative disease caused by the expansion of a polyglutamine repeat within ataxin-1 protein. The toxic effects triggered by mutant ataxin-1 result in degeneration of the neurons in cerebellum, brain stem and spinocerebellar tracts. The targeted overexpression of mutant ataxin-1 in cerebellar Purkinje cells (PCs) of the SCA1 transgenic mice results in the formation of cytoplasmic vacuoles in PCs. These vacuoles appear early on before the onset of behavioral abnormalities. Interestingly, we found that vacoules contain S100B and vimentin proteins, which normally localize to neighboring Bergmann glia (BG). Further, immunohistochemical and specialized silver stain analysis revealed that vacuolar formation is associated with alterations in the morphology of dendritic spines of PCs. To gain insights into the mechanisms of vacuolar formation, we investigated if vacuoles in SCA1 PCs have an autophagic origin or are a consequence of some other event. We examined the expression levels (by Western blotting) of microtubule-associated protein light chain 3 (LC3)-I and LC3-II, and the degradation levels of p62 (a LC3 partner) in the cerebellar fractions prepared from pre-symptomatic SCA1 and age-matched wild-type mice. No p62 degradation was observed; however, LC3-II/(LC3-I + LC3-II) ratios were significantly altered in SCA1 mice indicating changes in the autophagic flux. In addition, LC3 localized to PC vacuoles. Further, we observed a co-localization of myo-inositol monophosphatase 1 (IMPA1) with S100B in PC vacuoles. IMPA1 is present in PC spines and has been implicated in autophagy. In vitro studies using purified IMPA1 and S100B demonstrated that S100B interacted with and activated IMPA1. Both apo and Ca(2+)-bound S100B were found to activate IMPA1, depending on substrate concentration. IMPA1 is regulated by another calcium-binding protein calbindin-D28k (CaB), since we reported earlier that the CaB levels are reduced in SCA1 PCs, the activation of IMPA1 by S100B may modulate CaB-dependent inositol signaling. This may cause BG-PC interface to degenerate resulting in vacuolar formation. In sum, these data indicate that vacuoles appearing early in SCA1 PCs could be developing through some unknown autophagic mechanism.