Novel mouse models of oculopharyngeal muscular dystrophy (OPMD) reveal early onset mitochondrial defects and suggest loss of PABPN1 may contribute to pathology

Hum Mol Genet. 2017 Sep 1;26(17):3235-3252. doi: 10.1093/hmg/ddx206.

Abstract

Oculopharyngeal muscular dystrophy (OPMD) is a late onset disease caused by polyalanine expansion in the poly(A) binding protein nuclear 1 (PABPN1). Several mouse models have been generated to study OPMD; however, most of these models have employed transgenic overexpression of alanine-expanded PABPN1. These models do not recapitulate the OPMD patient genotype and PABPN1 overexpression could confound molecular phenotypes. We have developed a knock-in mouse model of OPMD (Pabpn1+/A17) that contains one alanine-expanded Pabpn1 allele under the control of the native promoter and one wild-type Pabpn1 allele. This mouse is the closest available genocopy of OPMD patients. We show that Pabpn1+/A17 mice have a mild myopathic phenotype in adult and aged animals. We examined early molecular and biochemical phenotypes associated with expressing native levels of A17-PABPN1 and detected shorter poly(A) tails, modest changes in poly(A) signal (PAS) usage, and evidence of mitochondrial damage in these mice. Recent studies have suggested that a loss of PABPN1 function could contribute to muscle pathology in OPMD. To investigate a loss of function model of pathology, we generated a heterozygous Pabpn1 knock-out mouse model (Pabpn1+/Δ). Like the Pabpn1+/A17 mice, Pabpn1+/Δ mice have mild histologic defects, shorter poly(A) tails, and evidence of mitochondrial damage. However, the phenotypes detected in Pabpn1+/Δ mice only partially overlap with those detected in Pabpn1+/A17 mice. These results suggest that loss of PABPN1 function could contribute to but may not completely explain the pathology detected in Pabpn1+/A17 mice.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Disease Models, Animal
  • Gene Knock-In Techniques
  • Genotype
  • Mice
  • Mice, Knockout
  • Mitochondria / metabolism
  • Muscle, Skeletal / metabolism
  • Muscular Dystrophy, Oculopharyngeal / genetics*
  • Muscular Dystrophy, Oculopharyngeal / metabolism*
  • Muscular Dystrophy, Oculopharyngeal / pathology
  • Peptides
  • Phenotype
  • Poly(A)-Binding Protein I / genetics*
  • Poly(A)-Binding Protein I / metabolism*

Substances

  • PABPN1 protein, mouse
  • Peptides
  • Poly(A)-Binding Protein I
  • polyalanine