Biomedical subjects

Wojciech Wiszniewski

Publications and source records attributed to Wojciech Wiszniewski.

12 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2026

De novo variants in the poly(rC)-binding protein gene PCBP1 cause a neurodevelopmental disorder.

Poly(rC)-binding protein 1 (PCBP1), a splicing factor and key member of the hnRNP E family, was initially characterized for its tumor suppressive properties. More recently, its role in gene regulation in the brain and nervous system has attracted growing interest. Through an international multicenter collaboration, we identified 16 de novo pathogenic variants in PCBP1 across 17 subjects from 16 unrelated families. All affected individuals exhibited intellectual disability (ID), with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) as a prominent feature. Functional analysis in primary hippocampal mouse neuron cultures indicated that PCBP1 variants impair dendritic arborization, underscoring their deleterious effects. Transcriptomic profiling by RNA sequencing of subject-derived T cells showed a distinctive signature characterized by significantly increased exon skipping. These results highlight the contribution of PCBP1 in neurogenesis and neuritogenesis, which is impacted by loss-of-function variants expressed in neuronal cells, thereby supporting the link between splicing defects and neurodevelopmental disorders. Collectively, our findings demonstrate the prominent role of PCBP1 in neurodevelopment, reaffirming the importance of splicing regulation in mammalian neurodevelopment.

Journal Article↗

PubMed2005

GJB2 mutations and degree of hearing loss: a multicenter study.

Hearing impairment (HI) affects 1 in 650 newborns, which makes it the most common congenital sensory impairment. Despite extraordinary genetic heterogeneity, mutations in one gene, GJB2, which encodes the connexin 26 protein and is involved in inner ear homeostasis, are found in up to 50% of patients with autosomal recessive nonsyndromic hearing loss. Because of the high frequency of GJB2 mutations, mutation analysis of this gene is widely available as a diagnostic test. In this study, we assessed the association between genotype and degree of hearing loss in persons with HI and biallelic GJB2 mutations. We performed cross-sectional analyses of GJB2 genotype and audiometric data from 1,531 persons, from 16 different countries, with autosomal recessive, mild-to-profound nonsyndromic HI. The median age of all participants was 8 years; 90% of persons were within the age range of 0-26 years. Of the 83 different mutations identified, 47 were classified as nontruncating, and 36 as truncating. A total of 153 different genotypes were found, of which 56 were homozygous truncating (T/T), 30 were homozygous nontruncating (NT/NT), and 67 were compound heterozygous truncating/nontruncating (T/NT). The degree of HI associated with biallelic truncating mutations was significantly more severe than the HI associated with biallelic nontruncating mutations (P<.0001). The HI of 48 different genotypes was less severe than that of 35delG homozygotes. Several common mutations (M34T, V37I, and L90P) were associated with mild-to-moderate HI (median 25-40 dB). Two genotypes--35delG/R143W (median 105 dB) and 35delG/dela(GJB6-D13S1830) (median 108 dB)--had significantly more-severe HI than that of 35delG homozygotes.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2005

Curcumin treatment abrogates endoplasmic reticulum retention and aggregation-induced apoptosis associated with neuropathy-causing myelin protein zero-truncating mutants.

Mutations in MPZ, the gene encoding myelin protein zero (MPZ), the major protein constituent of peripheral myelin, can cause the adult-onset, inherited neuropathy Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, as well as the more severe, childhood-onset Dejerine-Sottas neuropathy and congenital hypomyelinating neuropathy. Most MPZ-truncating mutations associated with severe forms of peripheral neuropathy result in premature termination codons within the terminal or penultimate exons that are not subject to nonsense-mediated decay and are stably translated into mutant proteins with potential dominant-negative activity. However, some truncating mutations at the 3' end of MPZ escape the nonsense-mediated decay pathway and cause a mild peripheral neuropathy phenotype. We examined the functional properties of MPZ-truncating proteins that escaped nonsense-mediated decay, and we found that frameshift mutations associated with severe disease cause an intracellular accumulation of mutant proteins, primarily within the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), which induces apoptosis. Curcumin, a chemical compound derived from the curry spice tumeric, releases the ER-retained MPZ mutants into the cytoplasm accompanied by a lower number of apoptotic cells. Our findings suggest that curcumin treatment is sufficient to relieve the toxic effect of mutant aggregation-induced apoptosis and may potentially have a therapeutic role in treating selected forms of inherited peripheral neuropathies.

Apoptosis↗

PubMed2005

ABCA4 mutations causing mislocalization are found frequently in patients with severe retinal dystrophies.

ABCA4, also called ABCR, is a retinal-specific member of the ATP-binding cassette (ABC) family that functions in photoreceptor outer segments as a flipase of all-trans retinal. Homozygous and compound heterozygous ABCA4 mutations are associated with various autosomal recessive retinal dystrophies, whereas heterozygous ABCA4 mutations have been associated with dominant susceptibility to age-related macular degeneration in both humans and mice. We analyzed a cohort of 29 arRP families for the mutations in ABCA4 with a commercial microarray, ABCR-400 in addition to direct sequencing and segregation analysis, and identified both mutant alleles in two families (7%): compound heterozygosity for missense (R602W) and nonsense (R408X) alleles and homozygosity for a complex [L541P; A1038V] allele. The missense mutations were analyzed functionally in the photoreceptors of Xenopus laevis tadpoles, which revealed mislocalization of ABCA4 protein. These mutations cause retention of ABCA4 in the photoreceptor inner segment, likely by impairing correct folding, resulting in the total absence of physiologic protein function. Patients with different retinal dystrophies harboring two misfolding alleles exhibit early age-of-onset (AO) (5-12 years) of retinal disease. Our data suggest that a class of ABCA4 mutants may be an important determinant of the AO of disease.

ATP-Binding Cassette Transporters↗

PubMed2005

SIMPLE mutations in Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease and the potential role of its protein product in protein degradation.

Charcot-Marie-Tooth (CMT) disease is a clinically and genetically heterogeneous group of inherited peripheral neuropathies characterized by progressive weakness and atrophy of distal limb muscles. Recently, SIMPLE/LITAF was shown to be responsible for an autosomal dominant demyelinating form of CMT linked to 16p (CMT1C). Although two transcripts encoding different proteins (SIMPLE and LITAF) have been reported from the same gene, we could not confirm the existence of LITAF. Here we show that the LITAF transcript appears to result from a DNA sequencing error. We screened the SIMPLE gene for mutations in a cohort of 192 patients with CMT or related neuropathies, each of whom tested negative for other known genetic causes of CMT. In 16 unrelated CMT families we identified nine different nucleotide variations in SIMPLE that were not detected in control chromosomes. SIMPLE mutations can occur de novo, associated with sporadic CMT1 and may convey both demyelinating and axonal forms. Bioinformatics analyses and other observations of SIMPLE suggest that 1) it could be a member of the RING finger motif-containing subfamily of E3 ubiquitin ligases that are associated with the ubiquitin-mediated proteasome processing pathway, 2) it could interact through its PPXY motifs with a WW domain containing protein, for instance with NEDD4, an E3 ubiquitin ligase, and 3) it could interact through the PSAP motif with TSG10, a protein associated with endosomal multivesicular protein sorting. Since both SIMPLE and Hrs are endosomal proteins and have both PPXY and P(S/T)AP motifs, we hypothesize that SIMPLE, like Hrs, is potentially a clathrin adaptor aiding in the retention of ubiquitinated proteins on to the endosomes. Thus the potential E3 ubiquitin ligase activity of SIMPLE, alteration in its interactions with NEDD4 or TSG101, or changes in its properties as a clathrin coat adaptor may underlie the pathogenesis of Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Evolution of ABCA4 proteins in vertebrates.

The ABCA4 (ABCR) gene encodes a retinal-specific ATP-binding cassette transporter. Mutations in ABCA4 are responsible for several recessive macular dystrophies and susceptibility to age related macular degeneration (AMD). The protein appears to function as a flippase of all-trans-retinaldehyde and/or its derivatives across the membrane of outer segment disks and is a potentially important element in recycling visual cycle metabolites. However, the understanding of ABCA4's role in the visual cycle is limited due to the lack of a direct functional assay. An evolutionary analysis of ABCA4 may aid in the identification of conserved elements, the preservation of which implies functional importance. To date, only human, murine, and bovine ABCA4 genes are described. We have identified ABCA4 genes from African (Xenopus laevis) and Western (Silurana tropicalis) clawed frogs. A comparative analysis describing the evolutionary relationships between the frog ABCA4s, annotated T. rubripes ABCA4, and mammalian ABCA4 proteins was carried out. Several segments are conserved in both intradiscal loop (IL) domains, in addition to the transmembrane and ATP-binding domains. Nonconserved segments were found in the IL and cytoplasmic linker domains. Maximum likelihood analyses of the aligned sequences strongly suggest that ABCA4 was subject to purifying selection. Collectively, these data corroborate the current evolutionary model where two distinct ABCA half-transporter progenitors were combined to form a full ABCA4 progenitor in ancestral chordates. We speculate that evolutionary alterations may increase the retinoid metabolite recycling capacity of ABCA4 and may improve dark adaptation.

ATP-Binding Cassette Transporters↗

PubMed2003

Novel mutations in the RFXANK gene: RFX complex containing in-vitro-generated RFXANK mutant binds the promoter without transactivating MHC II.

MHC class II deficiency is a combined immunodeficiency caused by defects in the four regulatory factors, CIITA, RFXANK, RFX5 and RFXAP, that control MHC II expression at the transcriptional level. The RFXANK gene encodes one subunit of the heterotrimeric RFX complex that is involved in the assembly of several transcription factors on MHC II promoters. Seven different RFXANK mutations have previously been reported in 26 unrelated patients. The most frequent mutation, a 26-bp deletion (752delG-25), has been identified in 21 patients. The other mutations are all nonsense or splice-site mutations, leading to proteins lacking all or part of the RFXANK ankyrin repeat region. We report two novel missense mutations, D121V and R212X, resulting in loss of function of the gene. We investigated the in vivo effects of these mutations and of three other point mutations on the expression of the RFXANK RNA and protein. The number of RFXANK transcripts was severely reduced in all patients except one. The RFXANK protein was barely detected in two cases. In addition, guided by a structural model of RFXANK, we investigated experimental mutants of the C-terminal tyrosine 224. Substitution Y224A, but not Y224F, led to the loss of function of RFXANK. Two null mutants, D121V and Y224A, were tested in protein interaction and DNA binding assays. The D121V mutant was unable to form the RFX complex, indicating that D121 is required for RFXAP binding. The Y224A mutant formed an RFX complex that bound normally to the MHC II promoter, but did not lead to MHC class II expression, whereas Y224F RFXANK retained the wild-type function. This indicates that an aromatic ring, but not the phenyl chain of tyrosine, is necessary at position 224 for normal RFXANK function. Studies on the Y224A mutant suggest that, in addition to the RFX subunits and CIITA, another protein is essential for MHC class II expression. This protein appears to interact with the fourth ankyrin repeat of RFXANK.

Amino Acid Substitution↗

PubMed2002

Three novel mutations of the CIITA gene in MHC class II-deficient patients with a severe immunodeficiency.

Four transacting genes, CIITA, RFXANK, RFX5, and RFXAP, control coordinate MHC II expression. In humans, defects in these genes result in the absence of MHC II expression and thus a combined immunodeficiency. CIITA is considered to be a master MHC II regulator and is responsible for the defect in complementation group A. Eight such affected families have been reported. We investigated the molecular basis of the defect in three patients in these families, all presenting a severe immunodeficiency. CIITA transcripts were detected in all three patients but in one at an abnormally low level. Three novel heterozygous mutations of CIITA were found in patients SP and RC. One SP CIITA allele contained a nonsense mutation, G2178A, leading to a premature stop codon and the other allele in SP was found not to be expressed. In patient RC, two in-frame deletions were detected: one of the nucleotides 3003-3084 corresponding to the exon coding from Leu(964)to Asp(991), in the paternal allele, and a CATdel3193-5 of the isoleucine codon at position 1027, in the maternal allele. Transfection of a CIITA-deficient cell line with the recombinant CATdel3193-5-CIITA cDNA revealed a loss of function for this mutant and retention of the protein in the cytoplasm. No mutations were detected in the 4.5-kb cDNA from patient OK but the level of CIITA transcript was found to be profoundly decreased. However, promoters III and IV were not affected. This last case represents the first described CIITA dysfunction due to putative mutation(s) in cis regulatory sequences of CIITA.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMedDate not supplied

[The principles of molecular diagnosis of recessive forms of prelingual non-syndromic hearing loss].

The GJB2 gene defects are the most frequent cause of autosomal recessive non-syndromic hearing loss (DFNB1). Epidemiological data suggest that 35delG is the most prevalent mutation found in 88% of mutated alleles. Another mutations - 313del14 was found in 7% of mutated alleles. The other mutations were identified only in single families. Following the analysis of distribution of GJB2 mutations in the Polish population we propose an algorithm for molecular diagnosis of DFNB1. We propose to screen all patients affected with prelingual non-syndromic deafness for 35delG mutation using ASO or multiplex AS-PCR methods. The presence of 35delG on two alleles confirms DFNB1. The identification of heterozygous 35delG mutation requires additional GJB2 analysis including 313del14 mutation detection and en exon 2 direct sequencing. To determinate the frequency of digenic (GJB2/GJB6) background of DFNB we screened 17 patients with heterozygous 35delG mutation for deletion of 342 kb in GJB6 gene. No such mutation was detected in the analyzed group.

Algorithms↗

PubMedDate not supplied

[Identification of T274I mutation in the SMN1 gene in a patient with spinal muscular atrophy].

Proximal spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) is an autosomal recessive neuromuscular disorder characterised by degeneration of motor neurones in the spinal cord. The symptoms of the disease are determinated by mutations of SMN1 gene. About 98% of SMA patients show homozygous absence of exon 7 SMN1 gene, the rest carry small intragenic mutations. Molecular analysis of the presence of exon 7 SMN1 gene deletion is considered as the screening test for SMA. We present a case report of a 9 years old girl with progressive muscular weakness of limbs and trunk. Clinical examination followed by electromyography and muscle biopsy was interpreted as a diagnostic of SMA 3. Molecular analysis did not reveal deletion of exon 7 SMN1 gene. Extended molecular diagnostics using direct sequencing showed missence mutation T2741. Thus, the absence of homozygous deletion of exon 7 SMN1 gene does not exclude SMA diagnosis. All patients fulfilling the diagnostic criteria for SMA, as defined by the International SMA Consortium, without deletion of exon SMN1 gene, should be analysed using direct sequencing.

Biopsy↗

PubMedDate not supplied

[Prenatal diagnosis of spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) -- indications, restrictions, interpretation of results].

INTRODUCTION: Proximal spinal muscular atrophy of childhood and adolescence (SMA) is a genetic autosomal recessive disease. Caused in 96.5% by deletion in the SMN1 gene. Owing to the homogeneity of the molecular defect. Secondary prophylaxis can readily be offered to families at risk of SMA. PATIENTS: Prenatal diagnosis of SMA was carried out in a group of 50 families. Which were divided into two subgroups: with high and relatively low genetic risk of SMA. In all, 55 prenatal tests were performed in the period 1998-2003. RESULTS: In the first group including 45 families at high genetic risk, 9 of the 50 tests were positive (18%). The diagnosis of SMA was tentative in 7 cases from this group and it was based only on the clinical picture (the affected children are not alive, therefore DNA samples are not available). Prenatal examination in 1 of these 7 families showed the SMA genotype. In the second subgroup including 5 families with relatively low genetic risk of SMA in none of the studies was there a biallelic deletion of exon 7 in the SMNI gene. Mainly parents of children with a severe form of SMA and having no healthy offspring asked for prenatal examination (73% of the families). CONCLUSIONS: Prenatal diagnosis could be offered to families even if the diagnosis of SMA was not genetically verified. The negative result should he then interpreted individually. Until the carrier test will not he introduced to routine procedures. prenatal diagnosis can be also offered to families at relatively low risk of SMA.

Adult↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Application of a rapid non-invasive technique in the molecular diagnosis of spinal muscular atrophy (SMA).

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Proximal spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) is an autosomal recessive disorder caused by mutations of the SMN1 gene. The most frequent mutation is biallelic deletion of exon 7 of the SMN1 gene. A small percentage of SMA patients present compound heterozygosity with a point mutation on one allele and deletion on the other. In the remaining cases the disease is unlikely to be related to SMN1 defects. The aim of our study was to estimate the frequency of the common biallelic exon 7 SMN1 deletion in our Polish SMA cohort and implement a test for assessing a molecular defect at the SMN1 locus versus defects in the other genes. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The molecular analysis was performed in a group of 269 patients fulfilling diagnostic criteria of the International SMA Consortium. The common SMN1 exon 7 deletion was tested by a standard PCR analysis. Patients lacking the common mutation were subsequently analyzed for a number of SMN1 alleles with a quantitative test based on real-time PCR. RESULTS: The frequency of homozygous loss of exon 7 in the SMN1 gene was 96.6% (260/269) in our Polish SMA cohort. In 5 of 9 non-deleted patients the real-time PCR analysis showed a decreased number of SMN1 copies. We anticipate that the non-deleted allele carries a second mutation in SMN1 which may contribute to the pathogenesis of SMA. We have also identified 4 patients (1.5%) with SMA carrying two SMN1 alleles without the exon 7 deletion. CONCLUSIONS: The molecular analysis of the biallelic exon 7 of the SMN1 deletion is a standard and reliable test in cases of SMA. Introduction of a quantitative test based on "real-time PCR" further enhances the diagnostic potential by increasing the detection rate of cases likely to be caused by point mutation of the SMN1 gene.

Cyclic AMP Response Element-Binding Protein↗