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Journal ArticleDOI

Mutations in the parkin gene cause autosomal recessive juvenile parkinsonism

09 Apr 1998-Nature (Nature Publishing Group)-Vol. 392, Iss: 6676, pp 605-608
TL;DR: Mutations in the newly identified gene appear to be responsible for the pathogenesis of Autosomal recessive juvenile parkinsonism, and the protein product is named ‘Parkin’.
Abstract: Parkinson's disease is a common neurodegenerative disease with complex clinical features1. Autosomal recessive juvenile parkinsonism (AR-JP)2,3 maps to the long arm of chromosome 6 (6q25.2-q27) and is linked strongly to the markers D6S305 and D6S253 (ref. 4); the former is deleted in one Japanese AR-JP patient5. By positional cloning within this microdeletion, we have now isolated a complementary DNA clone of 2,960 base pairs with a 1,395-base-pair open reading frame, encoding a protein of 465 amino acids with moderate similarity to ubiquitin at the amino terminus and a RING-finger motif at the carboxy terminus. The gene spans more than 500 kilobases and has 12 exons, five of which (exons 3–7) are deleted in the patient. Four other AR-JP patients from three unrelated families have a deletion affecting exon 4 alone. A 4.5-kilobase transcript that is expressed in many human tissues but is abundant in the brain, including the substantia nigra, is shorter in brain tissue from one of the groups of exon-4-deleted patients. Mutations in the newly identified gene appear to be responsible for the pathogenesis of AR-JP, and we have therefore named the protein product ‘Parkin’.
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The relative importance of the common main-chain and side-chain interactions in determining the propensities of proteins to aggregate is discussed and some of the evidence that the oligomeric fibril precursors are the primary origins of pathological behavior is described.
Abstract: Peptides or proteins convert under some conditions from their soluble forms into highly ordered fibrillar aggregates. Such transitions can give rise to pathological conditions ranging from neurodegenerative disorders to systemic amyloidoses. In this review, we identify the diseases known to be associated with formation of fibrillar aggregates and the specific peptides and proteins involved in each case. We describe, in addition, that living organisms can take advantage of the inherent ability of proteins to form such structures to generate novel and diverse biological functions. We review recent advances toward the elucidation of the structures of amyloid fibrils and the mechanisms of their formation at a molecular level. Finally, we discuss the relative importance of the common main-chain and side-chain interactions in determining the propensities of proteins to aggregate and describe some of the evidence that the oligomeric fibril precursors are the primary origins of pathological behavior.

5,897 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
11 Sep 2003-Neuron
TL;DR: PD models based on the manipulation of PD genes should prove valuable in elucidating important aspects of the disease, such as selective vulnerability of substantia nigra dopaminergic neurons to the degenerative process.

4,872 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
23 Jan 2004-Cell
TL;DR: The identification of critical control points in the cell death pathway has yielded fundamental insights for basic biology, as well as provided rational targets for new therapeutics.

4,741 citations


Cites background from "Mutations in the parkin gene cause ..."

  • ...Mutations in the E3 ubiquitin ligase Parkin causes the death of dopaminergicvolved in the DISC complex, the human diseases imply an additional function for caspase-8 in regulation of lym- neurons in autosomal recessive juvenile parkinsonism (AR-JP) (Kitada et al., 1998)....

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  • ...Consistent with thisinteractions mediated by DED-containing proteins de- termines a “cell renewal set point” to integrate the path- finding, aggregates of Pael are detected in brains from AR-JP patients.ways of apoptosis and proliferation....

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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: It is clear now that degradation of cellular proteins is a highly complex, temporally controlled, and tightly regulated process that plays major roles in a variety of basic pathways during cell life and death as well as in health and disease.
Abstract: Between the 1960s and 1980s, most life scientists focused their attention on studies of nucleic acids and the translation of the coded information. Protein degradation was a neglected area, conside...

3,990 citations


Cites background from "Mutations in the parkin gene cause ..."

  • ...Mutations in the gene appear to be responsible for the pathogenesis of autosomal recessive juvenile parkinsonism (AR-JP), one of the most common familial forms of PD (232)....

    [...]

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: It is reported that chronic, systemic inhibition of complex I by the lipophilic pesticide, rotenone, causes highly selective nigrostriatal dopaminergic degeneration that is associated behaviorally with hypokinesia and rigidity.
Abstract: The cause of Parkinson's disease (PD) is unknown, but epidemiological studies suggest an association with pesticides and other environmental toxins, and biochemical studies implicate a systemic defect in mitochondrial complex I. We report that chronic, systemic inhibition of complex I by the lipophilic pesticide, rotenone, causes highly selective nigrostriatal dopaminergic degeneration that is associated behaviorally with hypokinesia and rigidity. Nigral neurons in rotenone-treated rats accumulate fibrillar cytoplasmic inclusions that contain ubiquitin and alpha-synuclein. These results indicate that chronic exposure to a common pesticide can reproduce the anatomical, neurochemical, behavioral and neuropathological features of PD.

3,472 citations


Cites background from "Mutations in the parkin gene cause ..."

  • ...Rare cases of familial PD have been linked to mutations in α-synuclein or parki...

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References
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Book
15 Jan 2001
TL;DR: Molecular Cloning has served as the foundation of technical expertise in labs worldwide for 30 years as mentioned in this paper and has been so popular, or so influential, that no other manual has been more widely used and influential.
Abstract: Molecular Cloning has served as the foundation of technical expertise in labs worldwide for 30 years. No other manual has been so popular, or so influential. Molecular Cloning, Fourth Edition, by the celebrated founding author Joe Sambrook and new co-author, the distinguished HHMI investigator Michael Green, preserves the highly praised detail and clarity of previous editions and includes specific chapters and protocols commissioned for the book from expert practitioners at Yale, U Mass, Rockefeller University, Texas Tech, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Washington University, and other leading institutions. The theoretical and historical underpinnings of techniques are prominent features of the presentation throughout, information that does much to help trouble-shoot experimental problems. For the fourth edition of this classic work, the content has been entirely recast to include nucleic-acid based methods selected as the most widely used and valuable in molecular and cellular biology laboratories. Core chapters from the third edition have been revised to feature current strategies and approaches to the preparation and cloning of nucleic acids, gene transfer, and expression analysis. They are augmented by 12 new chapters which show how DNA, RNA, and proteins should be prepared, evaluated, and manipulated, and how data generation and analysis can be handled. The new content includes methods for studying interactions between cellular components, such as microarrays, next-generation sequencing technologies, RNA interference, and epigenetic analysis using DNA methylation techniques and chromatin immunoprecipitation. To make sense of the wealth of data produced by these techniques, a bioinformatics chapter describes the use of analytical tools for comparing sequences of genes and proteins and identifying common expression patterns among sets of genes. Building on thirty years of trust, reliability, and authority, the fourth edition of Mol

215,169 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
27 Jun 1997-Science
TL;DR: A mutation was identified in the α-synuclein gene, which codes for a presynaptic protein thought to be involved in neuronal plasticity, in the Italian kindred and in three unrelated families of Greek origin with autosomal dominant inheritance for the PD phenotype.
Abstract: Parkinson's disease (PD) is a common neurodegenerative disorder with a lifetime incidence of approximately 2 percent. A pattern of familial aggregation has been documented for the disorder, and it was recently reported that a PD susceptibility gene in a large Italian kindred is located on the long arm of human chromosome 4. A mutation was identified in the α-synuclein gene, which codes for a presynaptic protein thought to be involved in neuronal plasticity, in the Italian kindred and in three unrelated families of Greek origin with autosomal dominant inheritance for the PD phenotype. This finding of a specific molecular alteration associated with PD will facilitate the detailed understanding of the pathophysiology of the disorder.

7,387 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
28 Aug 1997-Nature
TL;DR: Strong staining of Lewy bodies from idiopathic Parkinson's disease with antibodies for α-synuclein, a presynaptic protein of unknown function which is mutated in some familial cases of the disease, indicates that the LewY bodies from these two diseases may have identical compositions.
Abstract: Lewy bodies, a defining pathological characteristic of Parkinson's disease and dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB)1,2,3,4, constitute the second most common nerve cell pathology, after the neurofibrillary lesions of Alzheimer's disease. Their formation may cause neurodegeneration, but their biochemical composition is unknown. Neurofilaments and ubiquitin are present5,6,7,8, but it is unclear whether they are major components of the filamentous material of the Lewy body9,10. Here we describe strong staining of Lewy bodies from idiopathic Parkinson's disease with antibodies for α-synuclein, a presynaptic protein of unknown function which is mutated in some familial cases of the disease11. α-Synuclein may be the main component of the Lewy body in Parkinson's disease. We also show staining for α-synuclein of Lewy bodies from DLB, indicating that the Lewy bodies from these two diseases may have identical compositions.

6,923 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Results indicated a specific defect of Complex I activity in the substantia nigra of patients with Parkinson's disease, which adds further support to the proposition that Parkinson’s disease may be due to an environmental toxin with action(s) similar to those of MPTP.
Abstract: The structure and function of mitochondrial respiratory-chain enzyme proteins were studied postmortem in the substantia nigra of nine patients with Parkinson's disease and nine matched controls. Total protein and mitochondrial mass were similar in the two groups. NADH-ubiquinone reductase (Complex I) and NADH cytochrome c reductase activities were significantly reduced, whereas succinate cytochrome c reductase activity was normal. These results indicated a specific defect of Complex I activity in the substantia nigra of patients with Parkinson's disease. This biochemical defect is the same as that produced in animal models of parkinsonism by 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine (MPTP) and adds further support to the proposition that Parkinson's disease may be due to an environmental toxin with action(s) similar to those of MPTP.

2,266 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
07 Oct 1994-Cell
TL;DR: Two studies clearly demonstrate that the ubiquitin-proteasome system is involved not only in complete destruction of its protein substrates, but also in limited proteolysis and posttranslational processing in which biologically active peptides or fragments are generated.

1,783 citations

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