Department of Neurology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA 02129, USA.
Brain Science Institute, Department of Neurology, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA.
Neuron. 2018 Sep 5;99(5):925-940.e7. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2018.07.039.
Tau is the major constituent of neurofibrillary tangles in Alzheimer's disease (AD), but the mechanism underlying tau-associated neural damage remains unclear. Here, we show that tau can directly interact with nucleoporins of the nuclear pore complex (NPC) and affect their structural and functional integrity. Pathological tau impairs nuclear import and export in tau-overexpressing transgenic mice and in human AD brain tissue. Furthermore, the nucleoporin Nup98 accumulates in the cell bodies of some tangle-bearing neurons and can facilitate tau aggregation in vitro. These data support the hypothesis that tau can directly interact with NPC components, leading to their mislocalization and consequent disruption of NPC function. This raises the possibility that NPC dysfunction contributes to tau-induced neurotoxicity in AD and tauopathies.
tau 是阿尔茨海默病(AD)中神经纤维缠结的主要成分,但 tau 相关神经损伤的机制仍不清楚。在这里,我们表明 tau 可以直接与核孔复合物(NPC)的核孔蛋白相互作用,并影响其结构和功能的完整性。病理性 tau 会损害在过表达 tau 的转基因小鼠和人类 AD 脑组织中的核输入和输出。此外,核孔蛋白 Nup98 会在一些携带缠结的神经元的细胞体中积累,并可以促进 tau 的体外聚集。这些数据支持 tau 可以直接与 NPC 成分相互作用,导致其定位错误和随后的 NPC 功能障碍的假说。这就提出了 NPC 功能障碍可能导致 AD 和 tau 病中 tau 诱导的神经毒性的可能性。