pantothenate kinase-associated neurodegeneration: insights from

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Pantothenate kinase-associated neurodegeneration: insights from a Drosophila model Zhihao Wu, Chenghua Li, Shan Lv and Bing Zhou State Key Laboratory of Biomembrane and Membrane Biotechnology, Department of Biological Sciences and Biotechnology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China Received April 22, 2009; Revised June 9, 2009; Accepted July 6, 2009 Pantothenate-Kinase-Associated-Neurodegeneration (PKAN) is a devastating disease, resulting from mutations in pantothenate kinase 2 (PANK2), one of the four human pantothenate kinase genes (PANK1-4). Interestingly, PanK2 appears to be the only mitochondria-targeted human PanK. It is unknown whether the mitochondria-targeted PanK is associated with any unique function, nor whether PKAN is due solely to the loss of pantothenate kinase activity. Drosophila PANK [fumble (fbl)] encodes several isoforms of pan- tothenate kinase products, one of which localizes to mitochondria and the others cytosol. fbl flies exhibit many characteristic features reminiscent of PKAN patients. Various forms of Drosophila fbl and human PANK2 were introduced into fbl flies to study their in vivo functions. Only mitochondria-targeted Fbl or human PanK2 was able to rescue fbl mutation, with the rescuing ability sensitive to the expression level of the transgene. Transgenic lines with low expression of normal Fbl or PanK2 displayed similar phenotypes as PANK2 mutant transgenic flies. These PanK2 mutants all showed reduced and phenotype severity- correlated in vitro pantothenate kinase activities. Amazingly, cytosolic PanK3 and PanK4 could mostly, but not fully, rescue fbl defects except the male sterility. Therefore, fbl appears to be the orthologue of human PANK2, and PanK2 is functionally more potent than PanK3 and PanK4 in vivo. We suggest that mitochon- dria-located pantothenate kinase is required to achieve the maximal enzymatic activity to fulfill the most chal- lenging task such as maintaining male fertility and optimal neuronal functions, and PKAN features are mainly due to the reduction of the total cellular pantothenate kinase activity in the most susceptible regions. INTRODUCTION Hallervorden-Spatz syndrome or more recently renamed as Neurodegeneration with Brain Iron Accumulation (NBIA), is a devastating neurological disease characterized by iron accumulation in the globus pallidus in the basal ganglia, cul- minating in a typical image called ‘eye of the tiger’ on T2-weighted magnetic resonance (OMIM 234200) (1,2). Typical cases of this parkinsonism-like syndrome present in early childhood with motor abnormalities, dementia, dysar- thria, dysphagia and retina degeneration (3,4). Although heterogeneous by nature, the major group of NBIA is Pantothenate-Kinase-Associated-Neurodegeneration (PKAN), so called because it is caused by mutations in the human pantothenate kinase 2 (PANK2) gene (5,6), which presumably catalyses the first step of Coenzyme A (CoA) biosynthesis route (7). There are altogether four potential pantothenate kinase genes (PANK1-4) in human. Intriguingly, although human PanK1, PanK3 and PanK4 all probably reside in cytosol (8,9), PanK2 is mainly targeted to mitochondria (10–12), although minor cytosolic isoforms might also exist based on the bioinformatic analysis of alternative splicing products in the public accessible database. This led to the suggestion that PKAN may be due to metabolic abnormality in mitochon- dria (13). Efforts to link pantothenate kinase activity of human mutations with the severity of PKAN patients have been taken, with mammalian cell culture as a testing paradigm. Surpris- ingly, some of the mutants expressed in these cultures appear to result in normal or even higher total pantothenate To whom correspondence should be addressed. Tel: þ86 1062795322; Fax: þ86 1062772253; Email: [email protected] # The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: [email protected] Human Molecular Genetics, 2009, Vol. 18, No. 19 3659–3672 doi:10.1093/hmg/ddp314 Advance Access published on July 13, 2009 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/hmg/article-abstract/18/19/3659/2386275 by guest on 12 February 2018

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Page 1: Pantothenate Kinase-Associated Neurodegeneration: insights from

Pantothenate kinase-associatedneurodegeneration: insights froma Drosophila model

Zhihao Wu, Chenghua Li, Shan Lv and Bing Zhou�

State Key Laboratory of Biomembrane and Membrane Biotechnology, Department of Biological Sciences

and Biotechnology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

Received April 22, 2009; Revised June 9, 2009; Accepted July 6, 2009

Pantothenate-Kinase-Associated-Neurodegeneration (PKAN) is a devastating disease, resulting frommutations in pantothenate kinase 2 (PANK2), one of the four human pantothenate kinase genes (PANK1-4).Interestingly, PanK2 appears to be the only mitochondria-targeted human PanK. It is unknown whether themitochondria-targeted PanK is associated with any unique function, nor whether PKAN is due solely tothe loss of pantothenate kinase activity. Drosophila PANK [fumble (fbl)] encodes several isoforms of pan-tothenate kinase products, one of which localizes to mitochondria and the others cytosol. fbl flies exhibitmany characteristic features reminiscent of PKAN patients. Various forms of Drosophila fbl and humanPANK2 were introduced into fbl flies to study their in vivo functions. Only mitochondria-targeted Fbl orhuman PanK2 was able to rescue fbl mutation, with the rescuing ability sensitive to the expression levelof the transgene. Transgenic lines with low expression of normal Fbl or PanK2 displayed similar phenotypesas PANK2 mutant transgenic flies. These PanK2 mutants all showed reduced and phenotype severity-correlated in vitro pantothenate kinase activities. Amazingly, cytosolic PanK3 and PanK4 could mostly, butnot fully, rescue fbl defects except the male sterility. Therefore, fbl appears to be the orthologue of humanPANK2, and PanK2 is functionally more potent than PanK3 and PanK4 in vivo. We suggest that mitochon-dria-located pantothenate kinase is required to achieve the maximal enzymatic activity to fulfill the most chal-lenging task such as maintaining male fertility and optimal neuronal functions, and PKAN features are mainlydue to the reduction of the total cellular pantothenate kinase activity in the most susceptible regions.

INTRODUCTION

Hallervorden-Spatz syndrome or more recently renamed asNeurodegeneration with Brain Iron Accumulation (NBIA), isa devastating neurological disease characterized by ironaccumulation in the globus pallidus in the basal ganglia, cul-minating in a typical image called ‘eye of the tiger’ onT2-weighted magnetic resonance (OMIM 234200) (1,2).Typical cases of this parkinsonism-like syndrome present inearly childhood with motor abnormalities, dementia, dysar-thria, dysphagia and retina degeneration (3,4). Althoughheterogeneous by nature, the major group of NBIA isPantothenate-Kinase-Associated-Neurodegeneration (PKAN),so called because it is caused by mutations in the humanpantothenate kinase 2 (PANK2) gene (5,6), which presumably

catalyses the first step of Coenzyme A (CoA) biosynthesisroute (7).

There are altogether four potential pantothenate kinasegenes (PANK1-4) in human. Intriguingly, although humanPanK1, PanK3 and PanK4 all probably reside in cytosol(8,9), PanK2 is mainly targeted to mitochondria (10–12),although minor cytosolic isoforms might also exist based onthe bioinformatic analysis of alternative splicing products inthe public accessible database. This led to the suggestionthat PKAN may be due to metabolic abnormality in mitochon-dria (13). Efforts to link pantothenate kinase activity of humanmutations with the severity of PKAN patients have been taken,with mammalian cell culture as a testing paradigm. Surpris-ingly, some of the mutants expressed in these culturesappear to result in normal or even higher total pantothenate

�To whom correspondence should be addressed. Tel: þ86 1062795322; Fax: þ86 1062772253; Email: [email protected]

# The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.For Permissions, please email: [email protected]

Human Molecular Genetics, 2009, Vol. 18, No. 19 3659–3672doi:10.1093/hmg/ddp314Advance Access published on July 13, 2009

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kinase activity than the normal wild-type PanK2 (10,14). Itremains unclear whether the existence of endogenous PanKsin these cell lines could complicate the interpretation of thestudy as it is known that PanKs function as dimers(8,10,15,16). In essence, the etiology of PKAN remains con-troversial (10,14).

A PanK2 knockout murine model was established to explorehow the deficiency in PanK2 might give rise to the specific andconsistent neuropathology in PKAN patients. As in human,mice pantothenate kinases also comprise four PanKs. Unfortu-nately, PanK2 knockout mice, although showing weightdecrease, retinal degeneration and male infertility, exhibit nodystonia and little alteration in basal ganglia, both cardinal fea-tures of PKAN patients (17). Nevertheless, application ofchemical inhibitor of pantothenate kinase (Hopantenate) ordeprivation of dietary pantothenic acid leads to movement dis-order and azoospermia (18,19). Taken together, it seems that thePanK2 knockout mice in general do not serve as an excellentgenetic model for the PKAN study.

The fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster has been demonstratedto be a powerful model to investigate the mechanism of thehuman neurodegenerative diseases (20–22). In contrast tohuman and mouse, Drosophila has only one pantothenatekinase gene [fumble (fbl)]. fbl gene exhibits maternal effect,as evidenced by that flies carrying even null alleles of fbl (fbl2

and fbl3) can survive to pupae. fbl1, a hypomorphic allele, isdue to a P-element insertion near the fbl locus. fbl1 flies manifestmuch decreased pantothenate kinase activity, male and femalesterility, movement coordination defect and neurologicaldegeneration (23–25), and normally die during the pupalstage or soon after eclosion. Interestingly, Fbl is also associatedwith several isoforms—one of them is predicted to be targetedto mitochondria (26), whereas the others are cytosolic.

Powerful genetic tools available together with the existenceof only one PanK in Drosophila could simplify the study ofunderlying nature of PKAN. In this work, we introducedvarious forms of PANK genes into Drosophila fbl, a relatively‘clean’ background, to study their functions at the organismal

level. We found that only the mitochondrial isoform of Fbl orPanK2 can rescue the phenotypes of fbl flies, although otherisoforms can not. When three mutant forms of PANK2found in PKAN patients were expressed in fbl flies, weobserved a shortened lifespan, male infertility, progressivelocomotion defect, and degenerations in both central nervoussystem and retina. Surprisingly, transgenic lines with humanPanK3 or PanK4 or a low expression level of mitochondria-targeted Fbl or human PanK2 displayed almost identical phe-notypes as the transgenic flies of human PANK2 mutants.These results indicate that the level of decreased pantothenatekinase activity determines the severity of phenotypes in the fblfly model, and suggest a similar scenario in PKAN patients.Our studies also provide a glimpse into the functional differen-tiation of various forms of PanKs in vivo.

RESULTS

Drosophila fbl gene encodes several isoforms of PanK withdifferent subcellular localizations

Drosophila, unlike human and murine, has only one PANKgene (fbl, CG5725) with five splicing isoforms. These splicevariants differ in their 50 exons as evidenced in theexpressed-sequence-tagged database of Berkeley DrosophilaGenome Project (www.fruitfly.org/index.html) (Fig. 1A).The isoform with the longest Open Reading Frame (ORF)(referred here as fblL or FblL by protein) is predicted to be tar-geted to mitochondria by MitoProt II (v1.101) (26). But theother isoforms or shorter ones possess no predicted mitochon-dria targeting sequence.

To validate the bioinformatic prediction, we engineeredfusion protein constructs of these isoforms (fblL, fblS1,fblS2) to the reporter Enhanced Green Fluorescence Protein(EGFP), called FblL-EGFP, FblS1-EGFP and FblS2-EGFP,respectively, and transfected them into Drosophila Schneider2 (S2) cell. The resultant cell lines were then examined tosee whether the EGFP fluorescence signals were colocalized

Figure 1. Different Drosophila PanK (Fbl) isoforms are associated with different subcellular localizations. (A) ORFs of Drosophila fbl gene. Five alternativelyspliced forms of fbl, designated as fbl-RA, fbl-RB, fbl-RC, fbl-RD and fbl-RE in the Flybase (http://flybase.org/), are shown here. fbl-RC and fbl-RD are associatedwith the same and the shortest ORF, which is a part of the other isoforms. fbl-RA, fbl-RB and fbl-RE, renamed here as fblS1 (short form 1), fblS2 (short form 2)and fblL (long form), include additional different N terminals. (B) Subcellular localizations of different Drosophila PanK isoforms. (Ba, Bd and Bg) Transienttransfected Drosophila S2 cells expressing Fbl isoforms (FblL, FblS1 and FblS2) fused with EGFP (Green). (Bb, Be and Bh) Mitochondria were marked withMitoTracker red CMXRos (Red). (Bc, Bf and Bi) Merged images for the Fbl-EGFP fusion proteins and the MitoTracker. FblL was predominantly localized tothe mitochondria, although FblS1 and FblS2 were in the cytosol. Scales, 10 mm.

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with the mitochondria as marked by MitoTracker redCMXRos. FblL, the longest isoform of Fbl, was observedessentially in the mitochondria, whereas the two shorter ones(FblS1 and FblS2) were found in the cytosol (Fig. 1B).Thus, different splice variants of Fbl are indeed associatedwith different subcellular localizations.

Fbl isoforms differ in their abilities of rescuing fbl flies

To analyze the functions of these differently targeted Fbl iso-forms, three fbl splicing isoforms fblL, fblS1 and fblS2 weresubcloned into the Drosophila expression vector pUAST,and made transgenic flies. Expression of these transgeneswas made possible through the use of the GAL4/UAS bipartiteexpression system, in which the transgene is activated by the

UAS binding factor GAL4. Gene expression was confirmedby RT-PCR (data not shown). For each isoform at least 2–3transgenic lines were analyzed.

fbl1 mutants normally die during the pupal stage with a fewescapers managing to eclose and survive several additionaldays (22,25). These rare survivals exhibit impaired locomotionability, infertility and neurodegeneration in the brain andretina. We compared the different rescuing efficiencies ofthese diverse fbl isoforms by ubiquitously expressing themunder the control of actin-GAL4. Interestingly, not all the iso-forms showed effective rescue. FblL, the mitochondria-targeted isoform, virtually completely rescued the eclosiondefect of fbl1 flies with the eclosion rate reaching 100% ofthe expected theoretical ratio (Fig. 2A). Lifespans of theseflies in many cases also recovered to nearly the normal level.

Figure 2. Drosophila Fbl isoforms differ in their abilities of rescuing fbl flies. (A) Rescue of fbl1 eclosion defect by various Drosophila Fbl isoforms. Rescuerates shown are relative, with 100% rescue representing a normalization of the theoretical ratio (16.7%) of the expected genotype class based on the designedcross. At least four individual crosses were set up, and more than 1000 progenies counted. Normal control stands for actin-GAL4/þ; fbl1/TM3. L-2 (long formtransgenic line 2) stands for actin-GAL4/UAS-fblL-2; fbl1/fbl1, and likewise for L-5, S1-5, S1-6, S2-2 and S2-12. Mutant control (fbl) is actin-GAL4/þ; fbl1/fbl1

throughout the figure (A–D). The L form of Fbl (L-2 and L-5) essentially fully rescued the eclosion rate of fbl, whereas S1 (S1-5 and S1-6) and S2 (S2-2 andS2-12) isoform did not show any benefiting effect to fbl. Data are presented as means+SE (n � 4). � and # P , 0.05, �� and ## P , 0.005, two tailed Student’st-test. � Compare with the theoretical full rescue rate; # compare with the fbl group. (B) fbl1 lifespan rescued by various Fbl isoforms. Median survival: normalcontrol (59 days), L-2 (58 days), L-5 (38 days), S1-5 (10 days), S1-6 (11 days), S2-2 (13 days), S2-12 (11 days), fbl (10 days). L-2, L-5 and normal control liveddramatically longer than fbl (log-rank, P , 0.05). Genotypes are as described in A. (C) Locomotion rescue. fbl and the FblS transgenic flies (S1-5, S1-6, S2-2 andS2-12) had very low scores to start with and their locomotion abilities progressively declined with age. Two lines of FblL displayed different rescuing abilities,though both dramatically improved over fbl: L-2 was obviously better than L-5. Data are presented as means+SE (n � 4). � P , 0.05, �� P , 0.005, two tailedStudent’s t-test. � Compare with the normal control. (D) Fertility rescue. In L-2 transgenic lines, both males and females were fertile. In L-5 only the female butnot the male fertility was restored. None of the S1, S2 lines and fbl was fertile, no matter in male or female flies. W indicates fertile and � infertile.

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However, the extent of lifespan rescue by FblL variedsomewhat from transgenic line to line. For example, FblL-2almost fully restored the decreased lifespan, but another lineFblL-5 extended the lifespan to a median level of 40 daysalthough the normal control was around 60 days (Fig. 2B).On the other hand, fbl1 flies expressing the short or thecytosol-targeted isoforms (FblS1 and FblS2) showed littleimprovement in eclosion (Fig. 2A) and lifespan (Fig. 2B).The locomotion defect in these flies also corresponded wellwith the eclosion and lifespan: those rescued by FblL dis-played little locomotion defects whereas those by FblS1 andFblS2 showed no apparent improvement over fbl1 flies at all(Fig. 2C).

fbl1 flies are both male and female sterile. Consistent withthe above observations, only the FblL form but not the FblSforms could restore fertility to fbl1 flies. Unexpectedly, theweaker rescuer FblL5 could only reverse the female’s fertilitybut not the male’s (Fig. 2D). It thus appears that rescuing malefertility, as well as full restoration of lifespan (not only eclo-sion), demands more FblL activity.

Given the hypomorphic nature of fbl1, we additionallyrepeated the eclosion rescue with these Fbl forms in flies car-rying the null allele fbl3, and obtained essentially identicalresults. We conclude not all the Fbl isoforms are functionalin vivo. The mitochondrial form (fblL) is the only functionalisoform and can completely substitute the original fbl genein all aspects examined. In contrast, the cytosolic ones(fblS1 and fblS2) seems insignificant.

Fbl is the orthologue of human PanK2

Among the four human PanKs, it appears that only PanK2 ismitochondrial (8–12). Nevertheless, expressed sequence tag(EST) analysis revealed that there might be other splicingvariants of PanK2 that could miss a potential mitochondriatargeting signal (11). We made a presumably mitochondria-targeted PanK2-EGFP fusion (PanK2m-EGFP) and a cytosol-targeted fusion (PanK2c-EGFP) construct, differing by thepresence or absence of a mitochondria signal at the N-terminal,and transiently transfected them into Drosophila S2 cells. Con-sistent with previous results in COS-7 cell (6,11,12),PanK2m-EGFP fusion protein was essentially mitochondrialwhereas PanK2c-EGFP cytosolic (Fig. 3B). The subcellularlocations of these isoforms were later further confirmed withdirect antibody staining of PanK2m and PanK2c expression(without the EGFP tag) in S2 cells (data not shown).

These features of human PanK2, reminiscent of that of Fbl,suggest that they might be functionally similar. To ascertainwhether mitochondria- or cytosol-targeted human PanK2 cancomplement fbl defects, PANK2m and PANK2c splicing var-iants were introduced into Drosophila. Ubiquitous expressionof PanK2m could rescue essentially every aspect of defect infbl1 flies. On the contrary, expression of PanK2c had noeffect (Fig. 3C–F). Again, we further tested the eclosionrescue of these in fbl3 flies and obtained similar results as infbl1 flies. The sequence homology, subcellular localizationsimilarity and functional equivalency between human PanK2and Drosophila Fbl indicate that Fbl, the only PanK in fly,is the orthologue of human PanK2.

Modeling human PKAN mutations in Drosophila: behavioranalysis

A number of mutations, associated with either early or lateonset PKAN, were identified at the PANK2 gene of PKANpatients (5,6,27–29). We studied three relatively common orrepresentative PKAN mutations found in patients: G411R,T418M and S241P (5,6,27,28). After these mutant forms ofPanK2m (simplified here as G411R, T418M and S241P)were introduced into fbl1 flies, their rescuing efficiencies oneclosion rate, lifespan and locomotion ability were analyzed.PanK expression levels in these lines were largely comparablebased on RT-PCR and western blot analysis (data not shown).Occasionally slightly higher, but never lower, expression ofmutant protein was noted in one or two lines. In the eclosionanalysis, T418M and S241P were able to dramatically increasethe eclosion rate, to a level comparable to that of the normalhuman PanK2m flies, although G411R could not at all(Fig. 3D). G411R also failed to rescue fbl1 obviously in theother parameters including lifespan and locomotion ability(Fig. 3C–F).

In the lifespan analysis, T418M or S241P rescued signifi-cantly but not fully the lifespan of fbl1 flies. The median life-span was extended to 30–35 days, although the normal controlmedian lifespan was typically around 60 days (Fig. 3D). Inaddition, the survival curves of these mutants were shapedabnormally, giving a typical disease model pattern—the popu-lation smoothly and gradually diminished in size along thewhole duration. This surviving pattern was also observed insome other Drosophila neurological disease models such asthat of the tauopathy (30).

Similar results were also recorded in the locomotion assays,in that T418M and S241P could only partially suppress theimpaired locomotion phenotype of fbl1 flies. Progressive lossof the movement ability in fbl1 mutants was difficult to quan-titate as they were extremely short-lived (24). When T418M orS241P was introduced, 10 days after the eclosion, the climbingability of the mutants lost quickly and progressively until theydied (Fig. 3E).

We also investigated how various PanK2 mutants couldrescue the fbl1 sterility. Normal mitochondria-targetedPanK2 could fully rescue both the male and female sterilityof fbl1 flies, whereas G411R had no effect. Interestingly,although female fertility was restored by introducing T418Mor S241P, the male flies remained sterile when carryingT418M or S241P.

In summary, the various phenotypes observed in the trans-genic flies could mimic some key features of the diseasesymptoms revealed in the corresponding PKAN patients.

Modeling human PKAN mutations in Drosophila:pathological study

After the behavior assays, we then performed histologicalexaminations of these mutants. A cardinal pathologicalfeature of PKAN or NBIA is neurodegeneration. fbl1 fliesalso manifest neurodegeneration in the brain and retinaltissues. We thus examined brain and retina sections ofthese fbl1 flies carrying various PanK2 forms. A vacuolarpathology may reflect the relatively rapid tempo of

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neurodegeneration in flies. Through H&E staining, vacuoliza-tion was displayed in all of the 12-day-old samples of fbl1 fliesand G411R mutants, and also in 30-day-old T418M, S241Phomozygotes. As expected, the vacuoles were not observed

in the brains of 30-day-old normal control and PanK2m trans-formants (Fig. 4A).

Because of the severity of the disease associated withPKAN, fertility has not been well recorded or tested in

Figure 3. Modeling PKAN mutations in Drosophila. (A) A summary of human PanK2 variants used in this study. (B) Subcellular localizations of PanK2m andPanK2c. Ba and Bd are transient transfected Drosophila S2 cells expressing PanK2 isoforms (PanK2m and PanK2c) fused with EGFP (Green). Bb and Be showcell mitochondria as marked by MitoTracker red CMXRos (Red). Bc and Bf are the merged images for the EGFP fusion proteins and MitoTracker. Scales,10 mm. (C) Eclosion rescue of fbl1 by human PanK2 variants. Normal control stands for actin-GAL4/þ; fbl1/TM3. PanK2m-2 (PanK2m transgenic line 2)stands for actin-GAL4/UAS-PANK2m-2; fbl1/fbl1, and so on for the others. Background control (fbl) is actin-GAL4/þ; fbl1/fbl1. Normal PanK2m greatlyincreased the eclosion rate, although PanK2c failed to benefit. T418M and S241P also could significantly improve the eclosion rate, whereas no meaningfuldifference was found between G411R lines and fbl. Data are presented as means+SE (n � 4). � and # P , 0.05, �� and ## P , 0.005, two tailed Student’st-test. � Compare with the full theoretical rescue, # compare with fbl. (D) Lifespan rescue by human PanK2 variants. Presented here are typical lines ofeach genotype. For each genotype at least two individual lines were analyzed. Median survival: normal control (59 days), PanK2m-2 (56 days), PanK2c-1(12 days), T418M-4 (35 days), S241P-4 (26 days), G411R-26 (12 days), and fbl (9 days). PanK2c and G411R did not increase the median lifespan(log-rank, P , 0.05). (E) Locomotion rescue by PanK2 variants. Normal PanK2m, mutant T418M and S241P were able to restore the locomotion ability offbl significantly, but PanK2c or G411R could not. Although progressive loss of locomotion ability could be seen in all the tested groups, T418M and S241Pexhibited much faster loss than the normal control and PanK2m flies. Data are presented as means+SE (n � 4). � P , 0.05, �� P , 0.005, two tailed Student’st-test. � Compare with the normal control flies. (F) Fertility rescued by PanK2 variants. For normal control and PanK2, both males and females were fertile; forT418M and S241P, only females were fertile but males were sterile; G411R, fbl and PanK2c were sterile in both sexes. W and � denotes fertile and infertile,respectively.

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Figure 4. Histological analysis of fbl rescue by human PanK2 variants. (A) (Aa-Af) Horizontal paraffin head sections of fbl1 (12-day-old), human PanK2 variants(12-day-old G411R, 30-day-old T418M, S241P and normal PanK2m), and normal control flies stained with H&E. Green arrows signify the neurodegenerativephenotypes. Ten brains of each genotype were analyzed, and the statistic result was presented (Ag). Severe neurodegeneration could be observed in fbl andG411R at early stages. Obvious vacuoles showed up in T418M and S241P at 30 days. Data are presented as means+SD (n � 10). �� and ## P , 0.005,two tailed Student’s t-test. � Compare with 12-day-old normal controls, # compare with 30-day-old normal controls. ND: not determined. (Ah–Am) Retinal

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human PKAN patients, in particular classical PKAN patients.Mice PanK2 knockout results in male infertility and fewer off-springs for the females (17). In fly, both female and male fbl1

flies are sterile. Histology analysis of fbl1 flies revealed greatmalformations in reproductive tissues. The female ovary wasdramatically reduced in size (data not shown) whereas nomature sperms could be seen in the male testis (Fig. 4B)(23,25). In fbl1 flies, Nebenkern spermatids carry large neben-kern and micronuclei at onion stage. Hemizygotes have degen-erative spermatocytes. Testes are short and nearly devoid ofgerminal content (31). Approximately 10% of the testis cystsin fbl1 male contain spermatids with mitochondrial aggregatesof abnormal size and shape, and multinucleate nuclei of differ-ent sizes (25). Testes from flies with various PanK2 formswere dissected and examined under the phase contrast micro-scope with DAPI staining. The sterile males with mutantPanK2 all displayed developmental deformity in the testes(Fig. 4B). By MitoTracker red CMXRos staining, we observedpositive signals of mitochondria aggregated near the end ofthese testes (Fig. 4C), where no nuclei (DAPI-positive)signals were detected. These results indicate that althoughsome PanK2 mutants can restore substantially (though notcompletely) other functions to fbl1 flies, they do little inimproving the spermatogenesis.

Levels of pantothenate kinase activity determine therescuing abilities and the phenotypes

When analyzing the rescuing capability of Drosophila PanKisoform FblL, we found some transgenic lines (stronger lines)performed better than the others (weaker lines). The strongerline L-2 could restore the median lifespan of fbl1 close to thatof the normal control (61 versus 63 days). In comparison, themedian survival time of weaker lines (L-5 and L-6) wasshorter (40 days for L-5 and 37 days for L-6) (Fig. 5B). Amaz-ingly, L-5 and L-6 also manifested progressive loss of loco-motion ability (Fig. 5C) and male sterility (Fig. 5D), verysimilar to what we observed in PanK2 mutant flies. Toexamine whether the different rescuing abilities associatedwith these transgenic lines are due to various expressionlevels of FblL, we analyzed the expressed mRNA levels inthese flies. Indeed, the weaker lines expressed much lowerlevels of FblL than the stronger lines (Fig. 5A). When we com-bined the weaker lines to generate a recombinant fly strain withmore copies of the transgene (L-5, L-6) so that FblL level isincreased, the resultant flies could live with a median survivalof 51 days (Fig. 5B). Accordingly, the locomotion was also dra-matically improved and fertility restored (Fig. 5C and D).Similar observation was also made in human PanK2 flies:expression in stronger rescuer PanK2m lines is higher than in

weaker lines. Although the increased expression of FblLcould enhance the rescuing ability, this phenomenon was notobserved for human PanK2 mutant lines: adding extra copiesof mutant human PanK2 did not significantly further improvethe mutant phenotypes such as movement disorder or male steri-lity (data not shown), indicating that under this scenario themutant phenotype arose from non-optimal specific activity ofthe mutant enzyme instead of lacking sufficient correspondingprotein product.

Biochemical function analysis of the three human PanK2mutants was also performed to examine how these mutationscould affect the pantothenate kinase enzymatic activity. Inthe background of Drosophila fbl1, which carries undetectablelevel of fblL transcript (Fig. 5A, last lane), the human PanK2mutants showed significantly lower kinase activity than that ofthe human wild-type form: G411R possesses no activity;S241P demonstrated �40% and T418M �70% activities ascompared with the wild-type (Fig. 5E). We also tested therelative activity of two FblL lines—L-2 and L-5: L-2 dis-played normal activity, whereas L-5, the weaker line, only�40% kinase activity.

The analysis suggests that the level of pantothenate kinaseactivity, as determined by the amount of enzyme and itsspecific activity, underlies the phenotype: the lower activity,the more severe phenotype.

Other human PanKs can significantly rescue most fbldefects except the male sterility

PanK2 is probably the only mitochondrial PanK isoform inhuman. On the basis of a set of in vitro experiments, it hasbeen suggested that PanK2 could only function in mitochon-dria whereas other PanKs function in cytosol (8–12,32). It isnot clear whether PanK2 is associated with any other uniquefunctions that are important for PKAN etiology and that theother PanKs may lack. To explore whether mitochondrialPanK activity is necessary for the fbl rescue, we engineeredtransgenic lines carrying PANK3 or PANK4 (12,32), two cyto-solic pantothenate kinases, that are (besides PanK2) relativelymore abundant in the brain and testis tissues (PANK1 is mostlyfound in the liver but not much in the brain, and in vitroPanK1 displays comparable specific activity to PanK3)(6,33). Interestingly, both PanK3 and PanK4 dramaticallyincreased the eclosion rate of fbl1 flies (Fig. 6A), and all thetransformants lived much longer than the fbl1 control, withthe median survival increased from 10 days (fbl1) to 40 days(PanK4) and 50 days (PanK3), respectively (Fig. 6B). In thelocomotion test, PanK3 and PanK4 also normalized the climb-ing defect of fbl1 flies when young, although after 30 days ofaging their climbing ability scores fell to 50% of the normal

degeneration appeared in fbl (12-day-old fbl1) and human mutants (12-day-old G411R, 30-day-old T418M and S241P), but not in 30-day-old normal control orPanK2m. Scales, 50 mm. (B) Phase contrast imaging (Ba, Bd, Bg, Bj, Bm and Bp) and DAPI staining (Bb, Be, Bh, Bk, Bn and Bq) of the fly testes. fbl (fbl1) andhuman mutants (S241P, T418M and G411R) were male sterile and displayed abnormality during their spermatogenesis, whereas PanK2m appeared normally.Green arrows denote the approximate positions where the late differentiated spermatids are located. (Bc, Bf, Bi, Bl, Bo and Br) Zooming-in pictures of DAPIstaining, showing the cometic nuclei of spermatids in the normal control and PanK2m testes, and the lack of pre-mature spermatids in the fbl and human mutants.Scales, 100 mm. (C) Mitochondria in the testes. Mitochondria (Red, MitoTracker) are localized tightly with the nuclei (Blue, DAPI staining) in the normalcontrol and PanK2m (Ca–Cc, Cp–Cr). The green arrows point to the merged signals. In testes of fbl and human mutants, intense and massive mitochondria-positive signals were observed, indicating degenerated and fused spermatids. No late differentiated spermatids were found in fbl and human mutants’ testes.Yellow arrows designate the abnormal mitochondrial signals. Scales, 50 mm.

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control (Fig. 6C), indicating weaker rescue ability thanPanK2m. Intriguingly, despite rescue was seen in most ofthese aspects, including the fertility of female, the male steri-lity was not restored at all (Fig. 6D).

In somatic tissues the central nervous system is mostsusceptible to PanK reduction

PanK is a housekeeping protein and essential for cellulargrowth. fbl1 flies display severe defects in neuronal functions,

fertility, and possibly other less severe defects, suggestingsome tissues are more susceptible to the loss of PanK. Tissue-specific expression of Drosophila PanK was utilized to findwhich somatic tissue is vulnerable to the loss of PanK function.Interestingly, panneural expression of mitochondrial isoform(FblL), driven by elav-GAL4, greatly complemented fbl1 fliesfor their eclosion, lifespan and movement coordination, butnot the fertility, increasing the lifespan medium from 10 daysto near 40 days (compared with normal about 60 days).This suggests that in somatic tissues nervous system is most

Figure 5. Levels of pantothenate kinase activities determine rescuing abilities. (A) RT-PCR analysis from the normal control, fbl1 and fblL transgenic male flies.Relative mRNA levels of fblL were determined by semi-quantitative PCR, using the ribosomal rp49 mRNA as the internal control. Compared with the normal,fblL mRNA was decreased in L-5 (58.5+3.65%) and L-6 (60.9+6.11%), although L-2 had a much higher expression level (170.5+3.47%) and fbl1 almosthad no mRNA in adults (5.25+0.22%). (B–D) The expression levels of Drosophila fblL correlated to their rescuing abilities. (B) Low expression fblL linesshowed similar longevity phenotypes as PanK mutants: significantly long-lived than fbl, but shorter than the normal. L-5, L-6 is a recombination line of L-5 andL-6 (i.e. contains both the L-5 and L-6 transgene insertions) displayed longer median lifespan (48 days). Log-rank, P , 0.05 (C) Low expression of FblL alsocaused the faster progressive loss of locomotion ability, like the PanK2 mutant, although increased expression level would greatly ameliorate that. Data arepresented as means+SE (n � 4). � P , 0.05, �� P , 0.005, two tailed Student’s t-test. � Compare with the normal control. (D) Fertility is also determinedby the expression level. Male fertility appears to demand higher PanK activity. (E) Pantothenate kinase activities of mitochondria-targeted PanK2 mutantsare correlated with their rescuing abilities. The kinase activities were normalized based on the total cellular protein amounts. Compared with the normal(100%), G411R exhibited no activity at all, although T418M and S241P showed decreased activities. L-5 had much lower activity than L-2. Data are presentedas means+SE (n � 3). � P , 0.05, �� P , 0.005, two tailed Student’s t-test. � Compare with the normal control.

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susceptible to the loss of PanK and other somatic tissues needmuch less PanK to be functional. In fbl null (fbl3) background,however, this rescue was not observed for the panneuralexpression of FblL, consistent with the idea that all cellsneed PanK but neuronal tissues are more sensitive to PanKreduction. We further explored possible differential effectsby expressing FblL in two types of neurons with different neu-rotransmitters: dopaminergic neurons (driven by ddc-GAL4)(34) and cholinergic neurons (driven by cha-GAL4) (35) inthe central nervous system. Expression of FblL in dopamin-ergic neurons resulted in drastically better improvement in life-span than that in cholinergic neurons, although the latter are themajor neuron type in the fly brain (Fig. 7B). In contrast, in themovement coordination assay, better improvement was

recorded when FblL was expressed in cholinergic neuronsthan dopaminergic neurons (Fig. 7C). To address the concernthat these variations might have arisen from expression differ-ences as a result of use of different drivers, we crossedddc-GAL4 and cha-GAL4 separately to UAS-GFP flies. Inten-sity of GFP signals from both types of flies turned out to becomparable at individual cell levels, although there are manymore cholinergic neurons than dopaminergic neurons(Fig. 7D). Therefore, although both types of neurons areinvolved in causing the lifespan and movement defects in fbl,differential effects are indicated: the dopaminergic neuronsare more relevant than the cholinergic neurons in the presen-tation of the shortened lifespan of fbl, but cholinergicneurons appear slightly more involved in the movement defect.

Figure 6. PanK3 and PanK4 can substantially rescue fbl defects. (A) Eclosion rescue of fbl by PanK3 and PanK4. PANK3 and PANK4 can greatly improve theeclosion rate of fbl1. PanK3-1 stands for actin-GAL4/UAST-PANK3-1; fbl1/fbl1, others likewise. Negative control (fbl) is actin-GAL4/þ; fbl1/fbl1 in A–D. Dataare presented as means+SE (n � 4). � and # P , 0.05, �� and ## P , 0.005, two tailed Student’s t-test. � Compare with the full rescue rate; # compare with fbl.(B) Lifespan of fbl rescued by PanK3 and PanK4. Much longer lifespan was observed when PANK3 or PANK4 transgene was introduced to fbl1 (log-rank, P ,0.05). (C) Locomotion rescue by PanK3 and PanK4. Although significantly improved over fbl, rescued lines still exhibited faster progressive loss of locomotionability. Data are presented as means+SE (n�4). � P , 0.05, �� P , 0.005, two tailed Student’s t-test. � Compare with the normal. (D) Fertility of fbl rescued byPanK3 and PanK4. PanK3 and PanK4 could only rescue the fertility of fbl females, but not males. W and � denotes fertile and infertile, respectively.

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DISCUSSION

In this work, we analyzed the functions of the cytosol- andmitochondria-targeted isoforms of Fbl and human PanK2,and used the Drosophila fbl mutant to create fly models tostudy human PKAN mutations. Fbl and human PanK2appear to function only in mitochondria, but not in cytosol,whereas both human PanK3 and human PanK4 work incytosol. Cytosol-targeted PanK3 and PanK4 can mostly comp-lement fbl defects except male sterility, similar to the weakerlines of FblL or PanK2 or to PanK2 mutant transgenic flies,suggesting PanK3 or PanK4 is functionally less potentin vivo than mitochondria-targeted PanK2 or Drosophila Fbl.In consistent to this, in vitro experiments have shown that

murine PanK2 has the highest specific activity, much higherthan that of PanK3 and PanK1a (18). In experiments not pre-sented in this work, we also tried targeting PanK3 to mito-chondria by adding an N-terminal mitochondrial signal.However, this engineered PanK3 failed to function well inthe fbl complementation test, indicating PanK3 can onlyfunction properly in the cytosol, but not well in mitochondria.It is thus apparent that various PanKs have to be located inappropriate subcellular environments to be fully functional,presumably due to their different regulatory properties as pro-posed before based on in vitro biochemical experiments (36).

In our study, severity of the phenotypes is strictly correlatedwith PanK activities: higher expression and potency areassociated with better rescue. For mitochondria-targeted

Figure 7. Neuronal expression of fblL rescues most fbl somatic defects. Different neuronal drivers, including panneuronal driver elav-Gal4, cholinergic neurondriver cha-Gal4 and dopaminergic neuron driver ddc-Gal4, were used to activate fblL expression in fbl background. Results obtained from two independentUAS-fblL transgenic lines were similar and only one (L-2 line) was presented here. (A) Eclosion of fbl rescued by neuronal expression of fblL. Normalcontrol: UAS-fblL-2/þ; fbl1/TM3, fbl (L-2): UAS-fblL-2; fbl1/fbl1, elav: elav-GAL4/þ; UAS-fblL-2/þ; fbl1/fbl1, ddc: ddc-GAL4/UAS-fblL-2; fbl1/fbl1, and like-wise for cha. Elav-driven expression could dramatically rescue the eclosion rate of fbl, and ddc and cha could also rescue to some extent. Data are presented asmeans+SE (n � 4). � and # P , 0.05, �� and ## P , 0.005, two tailed Student’s t-test. � Compare with normal control, # compare with fbl. (B) Lifespan of fbl1

rescued by neuronal expression of fblL. Neuronal expression could significantly increase the lifespan of fbl1. Among them, rescue by elav-GAL4 (elav) was themost efficient, and ddc-GAL4 (ddc) or cha-GAL4 (cha) more limited (log-rank, P , 0.05). (C) Paralysis rescue. Number of paralytic flies in each genotype wasrecorded and divided by the total number assayed. One day after eclosion, no transgenic flies of elav, ddc and cha showed paralytic phenotypes, whereas mostfbl1 flies (81%) did. Fifteen days after eclosion, 2.8% of elav, 38.5% of ddc and 19.2% of cha exhibited paralysis. ND not determined. (D) Relative potency ofddc-GAL4 and cha-GAL4 used in the experiment. ddc-GAL4 and cha-GAL4 were crossed with UAS-EGFP. The fluorescence signals within individual cells wereroughly comparable. Db and Dd are zooming in of Da and Dc, respectively. Scales, 50 mm.

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Drosophila Fbl or human PanK2, high expression levels arecritical for full restoration of the mutant phenotypes.However, for PanK2 mutants, additional increase of theprotein level can increase in vitro total enzymatic activitybut will not help much in vivo, indicating potency is anotherissue. It thus seems there are two limiting factors: one is theexpression level of the enzyme, and the second is the catalyticpotency of the molecule. In an in vivo system when the amountof protein reaches a threshold level the specific activity of thePanK becomes critical. Nevertheless, it is still intriguing thatsome mutant forms of PanK2 displayed significant pantothe-nate kinase activity (40–70% for S241P and T418M) andstill manifested some mutant phenotypes in the flies. Thesepartial activities most likely reflect specific activity as theprotein expression level is comparable to that of the normalone. On the basis of current data, we speculate that neitherthe amount of PanK protein nor the associated specific activityin a normal fly is in far excess. In consistent with this, it hasbeen reported that even heterozygous fbl flies could showsubtle pathological abnormality in the spermatogenesis (31).In this context, it is conceivable that 50% drop of specificactivity could be a serious event for the fly.

Previous in vitro biochemical data suggest T418M is associ-ated with no loss of PanK activity, although S241P results in alittle decrease (10,14). In that assay, different mutant PanK2was transfected to HEK 293T cells and the pantothenatekinase activity of each mutant was determined by deductingthe original endogenous activity from the total cellularkinase activity of the transfectant. Our in vivo and in vitrodata, however, indicate they are only partially active.Although the in vitro activities of these PanK2 mutants corre-spond well with the in vivo phenotypes in our hands, somecaution has to be taken when interpreting this in vitro databecause biochemical assaying condition is never the same asthe in vivo environment. In particular, PanK2 is targeted andfunctions in mitochondria.

PANK3 encodes a single cytosolic form of PanK (8), whichhas been extensively studied. Although PANK4 encodes aproduct with sequence similarity to other PanKs, it lacks anevolutionarily conserved and proposed catalytic Glu/Aspresidue, based on structural and biochemical analysis ofStaphylococcus aureus PanK (CoaA) (37), and possesses along carboxyl-terminal extension of unknown functions. Ithas even been reported that PanK4 has no pantothenatekinase activity in vitro (18). Nevertheless, this residue maynot be essential to all PanKs as alteration of it in Pseudomonasaeruginosa PanK failed to diminish the associated PanKactivity (37). Our observation that either of PanK3 andPanK4 can significantly complement fbl mutation indicatesin vivo they are both functional pantothenate kinase. The dis-crepancy of in vivo and in vitro results reinforces the notionthat in vitro activity needs to be interpreted cautiously, andsuggests the possible existence of some special and currentlyunknown catalytic/regulatory features about PanK4.

Among all the phenotypes examined, restoration of malefertility seems to be one of the most demanding. Althoughrecovery of eclosion rate is the first sign of rescue, moreactivity is needed to improve other features (movement, life-span, neurodegeneration and fertility). Male fertility isrestored only when all other features are close to that of the

normal flies. Why male fertility is the most challengingobstacle for the rescue? It is possible that spermatogenesismay require the highest PanK activity-the spermatogenesisof Drosophila involves successive mitosis and meiosis div-isions and further differentiation of stem cell to produce thelate elongating spermatids and finally the mature sperms.When PanK expression level is low (such as in some mito-chondrial PANK2 transgenic lines) or the specific activity ofPanK (potency) does not reach a threshold such as in thecase of PanK2 mutants, the spermatogenesis process mightbe impaired. Because during the differentiation and maturationof sperms most cytoplasm and organelles are gradually dis-carded and only nucleus and mitochondria remain (38), it isalso interesting to consider whether mitochondrial PanK hasfurther advantage over cytosolic PanK in surviving thisprocess. However, we do not have evidence to support thislater speculation unambiguously.

PanK2 mutant mice did not present the cardinal PKANneuronal phenotypes. It is likely that the corresponding braintissues in mice are less vulnerable to the reduction of PanKactivity. As lack of pantothenate via dietary control or thechemical inhibitor still reproduced movement disorder inmice (18,19), it has also been proposed that in mice the sus-ceptible brain regions might be associated with higherexpression of the other, cytosolic PanKs, which could comp-lement most of the PanK2 functions (33). Indeed, in the flymodel cytosolic PanK3 or PanK4 can restore most, thoughnot full, neuronal functions to fbl—the fly orthologue ofPANK2. It is thus possible that one or the combination ofboth contributes to the neuronal invulnerability of mice tothe lack of PanK2 activity.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Drosophila stocks and genetics

Flies were raised at 258C on standard cornmeal food. Stocksfrom Bloomington Stock Center (Indiana University, USA)include act-GAL4/CyO, elav-GAL4, ddc-GAL4, cha-GAL4and fbl1. fbl3 was a gift from Dr S. Wasserman’s lab (Univer-sity of California, USA). Transgenic flies were generated inw1118 background for each UAS construct by P-elementmediated transformation. Tissue-specific GAL4 lines andtransgenic flies were crossed with fbl1 or fbl3 to generateflies that carry the fbl mutant background.

DNA constructs

For the transfection of Drosophila S2 cells, FblL-EGFP,FblS1-EGFP, FblS2-EGFP, PanK2m-EGFP and PanK2c-EGFP fusion were all constructed in the pPac5c-PL backboneand fused with a C-terminus EGFP. Though the translationalstart point of human PANK2 remains controversial (5,12),mature product is relatively certain. PANK2m was made byreplacing the original CTG at the N-terminal of the maturePanK2 product (5) with ATG and PANK2c with CAG (sothat an ATG shortly downstream will be used), and placedin the pUAST vector, resulting the expression of the maturePanK2 with or without a mitochondrial signal peptide, asreported before (11). The position of PKAN-associated point

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mutations is numbered relative to the CTG starting site as pro-posed in (5), corresponding to 110 in the amino acid position iftranslated with an upstream ATG (10,14). Amino acid changesmimicking PKAN mutations were aided by PCR-mediatedDNA site mutagenesis and confirmed by sequencing.

Drosophila S2 cells culturing and transfection

Drosophila S2 cells were propagated at 258C in Schneider’sDrosophila Medium (Invitrogen, USA) supplemented with10% heat-inactivated FBS (Gibco, USA) and penicillin/streptomycin. For Drosophila S2 transfection, cells were cul-tured until 1 � 106 cells per 35 mm dish, and then transfectedusing Cellfectin (Invitrogen) according to the procedurerecommended by the manufacturer. A DNA/liposome ratioof 1 mg/5 ml was applied per 35 mm dish. Mito Tracker redCMXRos (Molecular Probes, USA) was used as the mitochon-drial marker.

Rt-PCR and western blot analysis

Total RNA was extracted from transgenic flies using TRIzolw

Reagent (Invitrogen). cDNA was transcribed from 1 mg totalRNA with SuperscriptTM II Reverse Transcriptase (Invitrogen)according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Semi-quantitative RT-PCR was performed using primers toamplify parts of rp49 (39) and fblL. Intensity of gel bandswas quantitated using ImageJ (http://rsb.info.nih.gov/ij/,National Institutes of Health, USA) densitometry. Primersused for RT-PCR are listed below: 50-GCACCAAGCACTTCATCC-30 (rp49 forward); 50-CGATCTCGCCGCAGTAAA-30 (rp49 reverse); 50- CACAGCAGGTGCAACAGCT-30

(fblL forward); 50- GTAGGTGCGTATCACGATGT-30 (fblLreverse).

For western blotting, a polyclonal mouse anti-human PanK2antibody (a gift from Dr Yien Kuo, University of California,San Francisco, USA) against a 14-mer synthetic peptide(AEGTRRDRLGSYSG) corresponding to amino acids 68–82(GenBank accession no. DAA00004) located downstream ofthe mitochondria-targeting sequence was used. Fly sampleswere homogenized in buffer containing 1% Trixon-100 plus10% proteinase inhibitor cocktail (Sigma, USA), centrifuged,separated on 10% SDS-PAGE and transferred to nitrocellulosemembranes (Millipore, UK). Rabbit polyclonal anti-b-actin(sc-1616-R, Santa Cruz Biotechnology, USA) was used as thecontrol antibody. Secondary antibody was HRP-conjugatedgoat anti-rabbit IgG or anti-mouse IgG (Zhongshan Golden-bridge Biotechnology, Co., Ltd., China). Signals were devel-oped with ECL detection kit (Vigorous Biotechnology,China). Protein bands were quantitated using ImageJ densito-metry (National Institutes of Health, USA).

Behavior assays

For behavior analyses, all GAL4 lines and transgenic lineswere prior outcrossed with w1118 for six generations for isoge-nization. For survival assay, 25 flies were placed in a food vial.Each vial was kept on its side at 258C and 70% humidity undera 12 h-light-dark cycle. Food vials were changed every 2–3days, and dead flies were simultaneously counted. At least

200 flies were prepared for each genotype, and the exper-iments were carried out no less than three times. For loco-motion assay, 20 male flies were placed in a plastic vial andgently tapped to the bottom. The number of flies at the topof the vial was counted after 18 s of climbing under redlight (Kodak, GBX-2, Safelight Filter). The experiment wasrepeated more than three times, and the data shown representresults from a cohort of flies tested serially for 30–50 days.For fertility testing, a mutant male was crossed with three vir-ginal wild-type (w1118) females, or conversely, a virginalmutant female with three young wild-type males. Afterseveral days, the progenies were counted. For each genotype,at least five individuals were tested.

Histological study

Fly brains were fixed in PBSþ4% formaldehyde overnight atroom temperature, dehydrated, embedded in paraffin and cut(4 mm thickness) as described (40). Sections were stainedwith Mayer’s H&E (Zhongshan Goldenbridge Biotechnology)and examined under a Nikon ECLIPES 80i microscopeattached to a Nikon DXM1200F digital camera. Continuoussections were analyzed and the numbers of vacuoles in eachbrain were recorded, and at least 10 brains were counted foreach genotype. For examining retinal degeneration, headsfrom properly aged flies were fixed in 4% formaldehyde andembedded in Epon. One micrometer horizontal sections werestained with 1% toluidine blue and checked under the micro-scope. At least six heads were counted for each genotype.

Testes were dissected in PBS solution and fixed inPBSþ4% formaldehyde at room temperature. After fixingfor 60 min, testes were washed three times in PBT(PBSþ0.1% Triton X-100) and subsequently stained in0.1 ng/ml DAPI (Sigma) for 30 min. Then they were trans-ferred to the mounting media (PBSþ70% glycerol) andmounted on glass slides before microscopic examination.

Fly lysates and pantothenate kinase activity assay

Flies were grinded and lysed in the lysis buffer (10 mM Tris–HCl, pH 7.5, 1 mM EDTA, 10 mM NaF and 5 mg/ml of leupep-tin). The lysate was centrifuged at 5000 � g for 5 min at 48Cto remove the cell debris. The supernatant was mixed withequal volume of saturated ammonium sulfate. After incubationon ice for 1 h, the protein precipitate was collected by centrifu-gation at 3000 � g for 30 min. The precipitated protein wasresuspended in the lysis buffer without leupeptin and dialyzedagainst the lysis buffer overnight at 48C.

Pantothenate kinase assay was performed with D-[1-14C]pantothenate (90 mM; specific activity 40–60 mCi/mmol;American Radiolabeled Chemicals, Inc., USA), in the pres-ence of ATP (2.5 mM, pH 7.0), MgCl2 (10 mM), Tris–HCl(0.1 M, pH 7.5) and the fly extract containing PanK2, in atotal volume of 40 ml (41,42). The mixture was incubated at378C for 10 min and the reaction was terminated by adding4 ml of 10% (v/v) acetic acid. Forty microliter of themixture was then deposited onto a Whatman DE81ion-exchange filter disk followed by three changes of washesof 1% acetic acid in 95% ethanol to remove unreactedpantothenate. 40-Phosphopantothenate was quantified by

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counting each dried disk in scintillation fluid by MicroplateScintillation & Luminescence Counter TopCount. NXTTM

(Packard, USA). Counts from the fbl background were sub-tracted from the data. Measured enzymatic activities werelinear with respect to protein concentrations and their finalkinase activities were normalized to the total protein levelsof the fly lysates.

Statistical analysis

P-value were calculated using the Student’s t-test (� or #, P ,0.05; �� or ##, P , 0.005). Survival curves were analyzed bythe method of Kaplan and Meier using SYSTAT 12.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We greatly appreciate the kind gift of human PanK2 antibodyfrom Dr Yien Kuo (University of California, San Francisco,USA), and fbl flies from Dr Wasserman’s lab (University ofCalifornia, San Diego, USA). We thank Sumin Guo for assist-ance in Drosophila microinjection. We are also grateful to theBloomington Stock Center for fly stocks.

Conflict of Interest statement. None declared.

FUNDING

This work was supported by National Scientific Foundationof China [#30330340, #30688001 and #30528004]; andthe National Basic Research Program of China[#2005CB522503].

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