Oxidative stress in skin fibroblasts cultures from patients with Parkinson's disease.
BACKGROUND
In the substantia nigra of Parkinson's disease (PD) patients, increased lipid peroxidation, decreased activities of the mitochondrial complex I of the respiratory chain, catalase and glutathione-peroxidase, and decreased levels of reduced glutathione have been reported. These observations suggest that oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction play a role in the neurodegeneration in PD. We assessed enzymatic activities of respiratory chain and other enzymes involved in oxidative processes in skin fibroblasts cultures of patients with PD.


METHODS
We studied respiratory chain enzyme activities, activities of total, Cu/Zn- and Mn-superoxide-dismutase, gluthatione-peroxidase and catalase, and coenzyme Q10 levels in skin fibroblasts cultures from 20 Parkinson's disease (PD) patients and 19 age- and sex- matched healthy controls.


RESULTS
When compared with controls, PD patients showed significantly lower specific activities for complex V (both corrected by citrate synthase activity and protein concentrations). Oxidized, reduced and total coenzyme Q10 levels (both corrected by citrate synthase and protein concentrations), and activities of total, Cu/Zn- and Mn-superoxide-dismutase, gluthatione-peroxidase and catalase, did not differ significantly between PD-patients and control groups. Values for enzyme activities in the PD group did not correlate with age at onset, duration, scores of the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating scales and Hoehn-Yahr staging.


CONCLUSIONS
The main result of this study was the decreased activity of complex V in PD patients. This complex synthesizes ATP from ADP using an electrochemical gradient generated by complexes I-IV. These results suggest decreased energetic metabolism in fibroblasts of patients with PD.
Departamento de Bioquímica-Investigación, Hospital Universitario Doce de Octubre, Madrid, Spain.
Pilar
P
del Hoyo
Alberto
A
García-Redondo
Fernando
F
de Bustos
José Antonio
JA
Molina
Youssef
Y
Sayed
Hortensia
H
Alonso-Navarro
Luis
L
Caballero
Joaquín
J
Arenas
José A G
JA
Agúndez
Félix Javier
FJ
Jiménez-Jiménez
D002478:Cells, Cultured; D004579:Electron Transport / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D005347:Fibroblasts / Q000201:enzymology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008928:Mitochondria / Q000201:enzymology; D018384:Oxidative Stress / Q000502:physiology*; D010300:Parkinson Disease / Q000201:enzymology*; D012867:Skin / Q000201:enzymology*