title: Recombinant AAV viral vectors serotype 1, 2, and 5 mediate differential gene transfer efficiency in rat striatal fetal grafts.
abstract: Intrastriatal grafts of fetal ganglionic eminences (GE) can reverse symptoms of striatal lesions in animal models of Huntington's disease. On the other hand, neurotrophic factors have been shown to protect host striatal neurons from ongoing degeneration. Neurotrophic gene transfer into GE prior to grafting could combine the benefits of striatal neuron replacement and in situ delivery of neurotrophic factors. Here we evaluate the potency of recombinant adeno-associated viruses (rAAV) as vectors for gene delivery into rat embryonic (E15) GE using the eGFP reporter gene under the control of the strong cytomegalovirus (CMV) promoter. We observed a very efficient expression of the eGFP reporter gene in organotypic cultures of GE infected with rAAV serotype 1 from 4 days until at least 4 weeks postinfection. In contrast, transduction was low and absent when using serotype 2 and serotype 5 rAAV, respectively. Two months after transplantation of rAAV2/1-infected embryonic GE in adult rat striatum, more than 20% of grafted cells expressed eGFP. The majority of transduced cells in the graft were neurons as indicated by colabeling of GFP-immunoreactive cells with the NeuN marker. Our study suggests that GE transduced by rAAV-serotype 1 vectors could be an interesting tool to mediate efficient expression of a gene coding a neurotrophic factor in Huntington's disease.
authors: Laboratory of Experimental Neurosurgery, Hôpital Erasme, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium. alubansu@ulb.ac.be
authors: Alphonse
authors: A
authors: Lubansu
authors: Laurence
authors: L
authors: Abeloos
authors: Olivier
authors: O
authors: Bockstael
authors: Enni
authors: E
authors: Lehtonen
authors: David
authors: D
authors: Blum
authors: Jacques
authors: J
authors: Brotchi
authors: Marc
authors: M
authors: Levivier
authors: Liliane
authors: L
authors: Tenenbaum
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D016380:Brain Tissue Transplantation / Q000379:methods*; D002470:Cell Survival; D017690:Cell Transplantation; D003342:Corpus Striatum / Q000166:cytology*; D003587:Cytomegalovirus / Q000235:genetics; D000229:Dependovirus / Q000235:genetics*; D005333:Fetus; D018014:Gene Transfer Techniques; D005822:Genetic Vectors; D049452:Green Fluorescent Proteins / Q000096:biosynthesis / Q000235:genetics; D009474:Neurons / Q000166:cytology; D009924:Organ Culture Techniques; D011401:Promoter Regions, Genetic; D051381:Rats; D017208:Rats, Wistar
chemical_list: C485184:enhanced green fluorescent protein; D049452:Green Fluorescent Proteins