A Novel Structure Associated with Aging Is Augmented in the DPP6‑KO Mouse Brain Lin Lin1†, Ronald S
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Lin et al. acta neuropathol commun (2020) 8:197 https://doi.org/10.1186/s40478-020-01065-7 RESEARCH Open Access A novel structure associated with aging is augmented in the DPP6-KO mouse brain Lin Lin1†, Ronald S. Petralia2†, Ross Lake3, Ya‑Xian Wang2 and Dax A. Hofman1* Abstract In addition to its role as an auxiliary subunit of A‑type voltage‑gated K+ channels, we have previously reported that the sin‑ gle transmembrane protein Dipeptidyl Peptidase Like 6 (DPP6) impacts neuronal and synaptic development. DPP6‑KO mice are impaired in hippocampal‑dependent learning and memory and exhibit smaller brain size. Using immunofuorescence and electron microscopy, we report here a novel structure in hippocampal area CA1 that was signifcantly more prevalent in aging DPP6‑KO mice compared to WT mice of the same age and that these structures were observed earlier in develop‑ ment in DPP6‑KO mice. These novel structures appeared as clusters of large puncta that colocalized NeuN, synaptophysin, and chromogranin A. They also partially labeled for MAP2, and with synapsin‑1 and VGluT1 labeling on their periphery. Elec‑ tron microscopy revealed that these structures are abnormal, enlarged presynaptic swellings flled with mainly fbrous mate‑ rial with occasional peripheral, presynaptic active zones forming synapses. Immunofuorescence imaging then showed that a number of markers for aging and especially Alzheimer’s disease were found as higher levels in these novel structures in aging DPP6‑KO mice compared to WT. Together these results indicate that aging DPP6‑KO mice have increased numbers of novel, abnormal presynaptic structures associated with several markers of Alzheimer’s disease. Keywords: DPP6, Alzheimer’s disease, Aging dementia, Presynaptic terminals Introduction DPP6 to be a novel gene in dementia, fnding enhanced DPP6 is a type II single pass transmembrane protein rare variants and nonsense, frameshift and missense muta- expressed in brain [35, 64], and well known as an auxiliary tions in early Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and frontotemporal subunit of the Kv4 family of voltage-gated K + channels dementia patient cohorts [9]. Another fnding by Zelaya [45], which play a crucial role in neuronal excitability and et al. [77] demonstrated an olfactory progressive proteome plasticity [23, 65]. We previously reported a surprising role modulation in AD, which shows olfactory dysfunction in for DPP6 in hippocampal synaptic development and func- up to 90% of patients. Tey report a specifc late reduction tion that is apparently independent of Kv4.2 [36, 37]. Clini- of DPP6 in the olfactory bulb of patients with AD. Overall, cally, the DPP6 gene has been associated with numerous these fndings provided basic information for understand- intellectual and neurodevelopmental disorders [6, 17, 33, ing possible roles of DPP6 in aging and the pathophysiol- 41, 43, 47, 53, 55, 56]. An important recent study showed ogy of diseases such as AD/dementia. AD is the most common form of major neurocogni- tive disorder (dementia). It is a progressive neurodegen- *Correspondence: [email protected] erative disease associated with memory impairment and † Lin Lin and Ronald S. Petralia contributed equally to this work. cognitive decline. Currently, defnitive diagnoses of AD 1 Molecular Neurophysiology and Biophysics Section, Program in Developmental Neuroscience, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National require post-mortem analysis and there are no curative Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 35 Lincoln Drive, MSC therapies for AD [7, 10, 57]. Diagnostic hallmarks include 3715, Building 35, Room 3C‑905, Bethesda, MD 20892‑3715, USA the abnormal accumulation of extracellular amyloid-β Full list of author information is available at the end of the article © The Author(s) 2020. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creat iveco mmons .org/licen ses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creat iveco mmons .org/publi cdoma in/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. Lin et al. acta neuropathol commun (2020) 8:197 Page 2 of 18 peptide (Aβ, amyloid plaques), intracellular neurofbril- structures associated with physical and biochemical mark- lary tangles composed of phosphorylated tau (pTau), and ers for dementia. neuronal loss. Tese abnormalities that characterize AD are particularly prevalent in the hippocampus such that Materials and methods “hippocampal atrophy is one of the earliest detectable Animals symptoms of ongoing neurodegeneration” [42]. Aβ and DPP6-KO and WT mice were weaned at 3 weeks of age, pTau pathologies are associated with neuroinfammation genotyped via PCR, and housed 3–4 mice per cage. Mice characterized by activation of microglia and astrocytes were housed under a 12-h light/dark cycle with the lights of and elevated levels of proinfammatory cytokines [50, 60]. at 18:00. We only used male mice in all experiments. DPP6- In both human patients with early AD and in mouse KO mice were originally from Dr. B. Rudy at NYU School of models of AD, Aβ accumulation precedes and promotes Medicine, New York, and WT C57BL/6 were originally from tau pathology. In human brains with early AD, intraneu- Jackson Laboratory. All animal procedures were performed in ronal Aβ42 accumulation in hippocampal cell bodies accordance with guidelines approved by the National Institute precedes hyperphosphorylation of tau [20, 21], and in a of Child Health and Human Development Animal Care and common mouse model of AD (3xTg-AD mouse), intra- Use Committee and in accordance with NIH guidelines. neuronal Aβ accumulation in cell bodies also precedes tau hyperphosphorylation [48, 49]. Microglia activation Electron microscopy and proliferation around amyloid plaques is also a key Hippocampi were prepared for transmission electron feature in AD pathogenesis. microscope (TEM) study as described previously [32]. Tau proteins stabilize microtubules and play a role in Briefy, WT and DPP6-KO, 12-month old mice were fxed axonal transport and neurite outgrowth [4, 5, 11, 63, 66]. in 4% paraformaldehyde plus 2% glutaraldehyde (Electron Tese functions of tau can be modulated by phosphoryla- Microscopy Sciences (Hatfeld, PA; EMS) in phosphate tion that can be both physiological and pathological to bufer (PB), then washed in PB and vibratomed at 150 µm. the cell. Tere is signifcant evidence that a disruption of Slices were washed in cacodylate bufer and placed in 1% normal phosphorylation events results in tau dysfunction osmium tetroxide in cacodylate bufer, washed again in in neurodegenerative diseases such as AD, and is a con- cacodylate bufer, and dehydrated in an ethanol series with tributing factor to the pathogenic processes [3, 25]. Te 1% uranyl acetate added to the 50% ethanol. Tissue was resulting abnormal tau accumulation in AD/dementia placed in propylene oxide (PO), and then in an epon/PO may lead, for example, to various axonopathies such as mix and fnally in pure epon; then samples were embedded axonal swellings [38, 70]. and hardened in an oven at 64 °C. Tin sections (60 nm) In this study, we examined the cell architecture and were placed on single slot, formvar/carbon coated nickel proteins associated with aging in the hippocampus of grids (EMS), stained with uranyl acetate and lead citrate, DPP6-KO mice, and discovered unique clusters of large and examined in a JEOL JEM2100 TEM (Peabody, MA). NeuN-labelled puncta concentrated throughout the hip- Images were taken from 2 WT and 2 KO mice, in all areas pocampal CA1 region that were larger and more abundant of the CA1, as well as in the molecular layer of the dentate and expressed at earlier ages in DPP6-KO mice compared gyrus. to WT. Tese structures partly colocalized with a num- Mouse hippocampi used for postembedding immuno- ber of proteins associated with AD, including Aβ, pTau, gold localization were prepared as described previously α-synuclein and chromogranin A. Labeling for a number [22, 36, 52, 65]. Briefy, WT and DPP6-KO, 12-month old of markers of AD was higher in the puncta of the DPP6- mice were perfused with phosphate bufer, followed by KO compared to WT, including Aβ, pTau, α-synuclein, perfusion with 4% paraformaldehyde + 0.5% glutaralde- and APP. Immunocytochemical and ultrastructural meth- hyde in phosphate bufer. Fixed brains were vibratomed ods showed that these structures are derived from abnor- at 350 μm, then cryoprotected in glycerol overnight, fro- mal swollen presynaptic terminals and are associated with zen in a Leica EM CPC (Vienna, Austria), and processed postsynaptic dendrites and synapses. We also found immu- and embedded in Lowicryl HM-20 resin in a Leica AFS nocytochemical and biochemical evidence for substantial freeze-substitution instrument. Tin sections were incu- gliosis. Our fndings demonstrate that DPP6, in addition bated in 0.1% sodium borohydride + 50 mM glycine in to its efects on early synapse development appears to be Tris-bufered saline plus 0.1% Triton X-100 (TBST). important for the maintenance of synaptic function during Sections were immersed in 10% normal goat serum aging as its loss leads to an increase in abnormal synaptic (NGS) in TBST, and primary antibody in 1% NGS/TBST Lin et al.