Mutations in a number of chromatin modifiers are associated with human neurological disorders. KDM5C, a histone H3 lysine 4 di- and tri-methyl (H3K4me2/3)-specific demethylase, is frequently mutated in X-linked intellectual disability (XLID) patients. Here, we report that disruption of the mouse Kdm5c gene recapitulates adaptive and cognitive abnormalities observed in XLID, including impaired social behavior and memory, and aggression. Kdm5c-knockout brains exhibit impaired dendritic arborization, spine abnormalities, and altered transcriptomes. In neurons, Kdm5c is recruited to promoters that harbor CpG islands decorated with high levels of H3K4me3, where it fine-tunes H3K4me3 levels. Kdm5c predominantly represses these genes, which include members of key pathways that regulate the development and function of neuronal circuitries. In summary, our mouse behavioral data strongly suggests that KDM5C mutations are causal to XLID. Furthermore, our findings suggest that loss of KDM5C function may impact gene expression in multiple regulatory pathways relevant to the clinical phenotypes.

Mutant huntingtin prevents interaction of the DNA damage repair complex component Ku70 with damaged DNA, blocking repair of double-strand breaks.

Using a high-end mass spectrometry, we screened phosphoproteins and phosphopeptides in four types of Alzheimer's disease (AD) mouse models and human AD postmortem brains. We identified commonly changed phosphoproteins in multiple models and also determined phosphoproteins related to initiation of amyloid beta (Aβ) deposition in the mouse brain. After confirming these proteins were also changed in and human AD brains, we put the proteins on experimentally verified protein-protein interaction databases. Surprisingly, most of the core phosphoproteins were directly connected, and they formed a functional network linked to synaptic spine formation. The change of the core network started at a preclinical stage even before histological Aβ deposition. Systems biology analyses suggested that phosphorylation of myristoylated alanine-rich C-kinase substrate (MARCKS) by overactivated kinases including protein kinases C and calmodulin-dependent kinases initiates synapse pathology. Two-photon microscopic observation revealed recovery of abnormal spine formation in the AD model mice by targeting a core protein MARCKS or by inhibiting candidate kinases, supporting our hypothesis formulated based on phosphoproteome analysis.

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It is hypothesized that a common underlying mechanism links multiple neurodegenerative disorders. We here show that TERA/VCP/p97 directly binds to multiple polyQ disease proteins (huntingtin, ataxin-1, ataxin-7, and androgen receptor) via polyQ sequence. Although normal and mutant polyQ proteins interact with TERA/VCP/p97, only mutant proteins affect dynamism of TERA/VCP/p97. Among multiple functions of TERA/VCP/p97, we reveal that functional defect of TERA/VCP/p97 in DNA double strand break (DSB) repair is critical for the pathology of neurons in which TERA/VCP/p97 is located dominantly in the nucleus in vivo. Mutant polyQ proteins impair accumulation of TERA/VCP/p97 and interaction of related DSB repair proteins, finally causing the increase of unrepaired DSB. Consistently, the recovery of lifespan in polyQ disease fly models by TERA/VCP/p97 corresponds well to the improvement of DSB in neurons. Taken together, our results provide a novel common pathomechanism in multiple polyQ diseases that is mediated by DNA repair function of TERA/VCP/p97.