β-Arrestin2 Couples Metabotropic Glutamate Receptor 5 to Neuronal Protein Synthesis and Is a Potential Target to Treat Fragile X.

Synaptic protein synthesis is essential for modification of the brain by experience and is aberrant in several genetically defined disorders, notably fragile X (FX), a heritable cause of autism and intellectual disability. Neural activity directs local protein synthesis via activation of metabotropic glutamate receptor 5 (mGlu), yet how mGlu couples to the intracellular signaling pathways that regulate mRNA translation is poorly understood. Here, we provide evidence that β-arrestin2 mediates mGlu-stimulated protein synthesis in the hippocampus and show that genetic reduction of β-arrestin2 corrects aberrant synaptic plasticity and cognition in the Fmr1 mouse model of FX. Importantly, reducing β-arrestin2 does not induce psychotomimetic activity associated with full mGlu inhibitors and does not affect G signaling. Thus, in addition to identifying a key requirement for mGlu-stimulated protein synthesis, these data suggest that β-arrestin2-biased negative modulators of mGlu offer significant advantages over first-generation inhibitors for the treatment of FX and related disorders.