Department of Neurology and Alzheimer Center Erasmus MC, Erasmus University Medical Center, Dr. Molewaterplein 40, 3015GD, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neurobiology, Center for Neurogenomics and Cognitive Research, Amsterdam Neuroscience, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Acta Neuropathol Commun. 2022 Dec 28;10(1):190. doi: 10.1186/s40478-022-01499-1.
Semantic dementia (SD) is a clinical subtype of frontotemporal dementia consistent with the neuropathological diagnosis frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) TDP type C, with characteristic round TDP-43 protein inclusions in the dentate gyrus. Despite this striking clinicopathological concordance, the pathogenic mechanisms are largely unexplained forestalling the development of targeted therapeutics. To address this, we carried out laser capture microdissection of the dentate gyrus of 15 SD patients and 17 non-demented controls, and assessed relative protein abundance changes by label-free quantitative mass spectrometry. To identify SD specific proteins, we compared our results to eight other FTLD and Alzheimer's disease (AD) proteomic datasets of cortical brain tissue, parallel with functional enrichment analyses and protein-protein interactions (PPI). Of the total 5,354 quantified proteins, 151 showed differential abundance in SD patients (adjusted P-value < 0.01). Seventy-nine proteins were considered potentially SD specific as these were not detected, or demonstrated insignificant or opposite change in FTLD/AD. Functional enrichment indicated an overrepresentation of pathways related to the immune response, metabolic processes, and cell-junction assembly. PPI analysis highlighted a cluster of interacting proteins associated with adherens junction and cadherin binding, the cadherin-catenin complex. Multiple proteins in this complex showed significant upregulation in SD, including β-catenin (CTNNB1), γ-catenin (JUP), and N-cadherin (CDH2), which were not observed in other neurodegenerative proteomic studies, and hence may resemble SD specific involvement. A trend of upregulation of all three proteins was observed by immunoblotting of whole hippocampus tissue, albeit only significant for N-cadherin. In summary, we discovered a specific increase of cell adhesion proteins in SD constituting the cadherin-catenin complex at the synaptic membrane, essential for synaptic signaling. Although further investigation and validation are warranted, we anticipate that these findings will help unravel the disease processes underlying SD.
语义性痴呆 (SD) 是额颞叶痴呆的一种临床亚型,与神经病理学诊断额颞叶变性 (FTLD) TDP 型 C 一致,在齿状回中有特征性的圆形 TDP-43 蛋白包涵体。尽管这种明显的临床病理一致性,但发病机制在很大程度上仍未得到解释,从而阻碍了靶向治疗的发展。为了解决这个问题,我们对 15 名 SD 患者和 17 名非痴呆对照者的齿状回进行了激光捕获微解剖,并通过无标记定量质谱法评估了相对蛋白质丰度变化。为了确定 SD 特异性蛋白,我们将我们的结果与皮质脑组织的其他 8 个 FTLD 和阿尔茨海默病 (AD) 蛋白质组数据集进行了比较,同时进行了功能富集分析和蛋白质-蛋白质相互作用 (PPI)。在总共 5354 种定量蛋白质中,151 种在 SD 患者中显示出丰度差异 (调整后的 P 值 < 0.01)。79 种蛋白质被认为可能是 SD 特异性的,因为这些蛋白质在 FTLD/AD 中未被检测到,或者显示出不显著或相反的变化。功能富集表明,与免疫反应、代谢过程和细胞连接组装相关的途径存在过度表达。PPI 分析突出了一个与黏着连接和钙粘蛋白结合相关的相互作用蛋白簇,即钙粘蛋白-连环蛋白复合物。该复合物中的多种蛋白质在 SD 中表现出显著的上调,包括β-连环蛋白 (CTNNB1)、γ-连环蛋白 (JUP) 和 N-钙粘蛋白 (CDH2),这些蛋白质在其他神经退行性蛋白质组学研究中未被观察到,因此可能类似于 SD 特异性的参与。通过对整个海马组织进行免疫印迹分析,观察到所有三种蛋白质的上调趋势,尽管仅 N-钙粘蛋白具有统计学意义。总之,我们发现 SD 中细胞黏附蛋白的特异性增加,构成了突触膜上的钙粘蛋白-连环蛋白复合物,这对突触信号传递至关重要。尽管需要进一步的研究和验证,但我们预计这些发现将有助于揭示 SD 背后的疾病过程。