PSD95

PSD-95 at the crossroads

Crossroads are crucial. The protein PSD-95 stands at a crossroads in the nerve cell synapse of information flowing in both directions between key receptors or channels and signalling systems that connect to cell physiology. This protein is named after a Drosophila homologue - discs large: what better place to study it? It is the most important crossroads protein in the major excitatory synapse of the brain, with the NMDA receptor its best-known interactor. Variation in the level of expression or cellular localisation of PSD-95, and changes to its interaction capacity with partner proteins, play roles in synapse development and plastic changes in learning, but when they go wrong can contribute to neurological and neurodegenerative diseases.

An example from normal development is the movement of PSD-95 from nerve cell soma to synapses in postnatal rodent visual cortical cells after the eyes open (Yoshii et al., 2011). In synaptic plasticity, modulation of PSD-95 ubiquitination controls NMDA receptor induced AMPA receptor endocytosis (Bianchetta et al., 2011).

Genetic evidence points to PSD-95 involvement in schizophrenia: genetic variation in the promoter of the DLG-4 gene associates with schizophrenia (Cheng et al., 2010), and the protein complex including PSD-95 has been convincingly linked to schizophrenia by genomic copy number variant analysis (Kirov et al., 2011).

In Huntington's disease, increases in the well-known excitotoxicity mediated by NMDA receptors may be important. Huntingtin (htt) interacts with PSD-95. In cell culture, pathogenic polyQhtt drives the interaction between PSD-95 and NMDA receptors, leading to increased excitotoxicity (Fan et al., 2009).

PSD-95's lynchpin role in excitotoxicity control is also highlighted by work on Tau toxicity (Ittner et al., 2010). Tau targets Fyn to the synapse, where it phosphorylates PSD-95, increasing PSD-95-NMDAR interaction and excitotoxicity. Its now well accepted that Tau plays an important role in execution of the cell death programme of Alzheimer's disease initiated by AΒ42.

In Alzheimer's disease, falls in PSD-95 level are commonly observed, most notably in mild cognitive impairment, a pre-Alzheimer's state (Sultana et al., 2010), and many studies show effects of AΒ42 on PSD-95 expression. As well as losing function in plasticity and learning, this can also signal increased cell damage via caspase induction (Liu et al., 2010).

PSD-95 is just one of the human proteins which Brainwave-Discovery Ltd. is expressing in Drosophila synapses. We can help you find out the in vivo effects of your compounds on interactions of PSD-95 with its partners, within a normal or an Alzheimer's disease background. We also link in to a Europe-wide synaptic analysis network, SynSys. For more information check out our website or contact info@brainwave-discovery.com.

References:

• Yoshii A et al., 2011. J. Neurosci. 31, 11894-904 PMID: 21849550
• Bianchetta MJ et al. 2011. J. Neurosci. 31 12029-35 PMID: 21849563
• Kirov G. et al, 2011. Molec. Psychiatry 15.11.2011 1-12 PMID:22083728
• Cheng MC et al., 2010. PLoS One 5, e15107 PMID: 21151988
• Fan, J., et al., 2009. J. Neurosci. 29, 10928-38 PMID: 19726651
• Ittner LM et al., 2010. Cell 142, 387-97 PMID: 20655099
• Sultana R, et al. 2010. J. Neuroscience Res., 88,469-77 PMID: 19774677
• Liu J. et al., 2010. J Alzheimer's Dis. 22, 541-56 PMID: 20847396