Machado–Joseph disease (MJD) is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by an abnormal expansion of the CAG triplet in the ATXN3 gene, translating into a polyglutamine tract within the ataxin-3 protein. The available treatments only ameliorate symptomatology and do not block disease progression. In this study we find that caloric restriction dramatically rescues the motor incoordination, imbalance and the associated neuropathology in transgenic MJD mice. We further show that caloric restriction rescues SIRT1 levels in transgenic MJD mice, whereas silencing SIRT1 is sufficient to prevent the beneficial effects on MJD pathology. In addition, the re-establishment of SIRT1 levels in MJD mouse model, through the gene delivery approach, significantly ameliorates neuropathology, reducing neuroinflammation and activating autophagy. Furthermore, the pharmacological activation of SIRT1 with resveratrol significantly reduces motor incoordination of MJD mice. The pharmacological SIRT1 activation could provide important benefits to treat MJD patients.

Machado-Joseph disease (MJD) is a genetic neurodegenerative disease caused by an expanded polyglutamine tract within the protein ataxin-3 (ATXN3). Despite current efforts, MJD's mechanism of pathogenesis remains unclear and no disease-modifying treatment is available. Therefore, in this study, we investigated (1) the role of the 3' UTR of ATXN3, a putative microRNA (miRNA) target, (2) whether miRNA biogenesis and machinery are dysfunctional in MJD, and (3) which specific miRNAs target ATXN3-3' UTR and whether they can alleviate MJD neuropathology in vivo. Our results demonstrate that endogenous miRNAs, by targeting sequences in the 3' UTR, robustly reduce ATXN3 expression and aggregation in vitro and neurodegeneration and neuroinflammation in vivo. Importantly, we found an abnormal MJD-associated downregulation of genes involved in miRNA biogenesis and silencing activity. Finally, we identified three miRNAs-mir-9, mir-181a, and mir-494-that interact with the ATXN3-3' UTR and whose expression is dysregulated in human MJD neurons and in other MJD cell and animal models. Furthermore, overexpression of these miRNAs in mice resulted in reduction of mutATXN3 levels, aggregate counts, and neuronal dysfunction. Altogether, these findings indicate that endogenous miRNAs and the 3' UTR of ATXN3 play a crucial role in MJD pathogenesis and provide a promising opportunity for MJD treatment.

Machado-Joseph disease (MJD) is a fatal, dominantly inherited neurodegenerative disorder associated with an expanded polyglutamine tract within the ataxin-3 protein, and characterized by progressive impairment of motor coordination, associated with neurodegeneration of specific brain regions, including cerebellum and striatum. The currently available therapies do not allow modification of disease progression. Neuropeptide Y (NPY) has been shown to exert potent neuroprotective effects by multiple pathways associated with the MJD mechanisms of disease. Thus, we evaluated NPY levels in MJD and investigated whether raising NPY by gene transfer would alleviate neuropathological and behavioural deficits in cerebellar and striatal mouse models of the disease. For that, a cerebellar transgenic and a striatal lentiviral-based models of MJD were used. NPY overexpression in the affected brain regions in these two mouse models was obtained by stereotaxic injection of adeno-associated viral vectors encoding NPY. Up to 8 weeks after viral injection, balance and motor coordination behaviour and neuropathology were analysed. We observed that NPY levels were decreased in two MJD patients' cerebella and in striata and cerebella of disease mouse models. Furthermore, overexpression of NPY alleviated the motor coordination impairments and attenuated the related neuropathological parameters, preserving cerebellar volume and granular layer thickness, reducing striatal lesion and decreasing mutant ataxin-3 aggregation. Additionally, NPY mediated increase of brain-derived neurotrophic factor levels and decreased neuroinflammation markers. Our data suggest that NPY is a potential therapeutic strategy for MJD.

Background: Machado-Joseph disease (MJD), also known as spinocerebellar ataxia type 3, is the most common of the dominantly inherited ataxias worldwide and is characterized by mutant ataxin-3 aggregation and neuronal degeneration. There is no treatment available to block or delay disease progression. In this work we investigated whether trehalose, a natural occurring disaccharide widely used in food and cosmetic industry, would rescue biochemical, behavioral and neuropathological features of an in vitro and of a severe MJD transgenic mouse model. Methods: Two MJD animal models, a lentiviral based and a transgenic model, were orally treated with 2% trehalose solution for a period of 4 and 30 weeks, respectively. Motor behavior (rotarod, grip strength and footprint patterns) was evaluated at different time points and neuropathological features were evaluated upon in-life phase termination. Results: Trehalose-treated MJD mice equilibrated for a longer time in the rotarod apparatus and exhibited an improvement of ataxic gait in footprint analysis. Trehalose-mediated improvements in motor behaviour were associated with a reduction of the MJD-associated neuropathology, as MJD transgenic mice treated with trehalose presented preservation of cerebellar layers thickness and a decrease in the size of ataxin-3 aggregates in Purkinje cells. In agreement, an improvement of neuropathological features was also observed in the full length lentiviral-based mouse model of MJD submitted to 2% trehalose treatment. Conclusions: The present study suggests trehalose as a safety pharmacological strategy to counteract MJD-associated behavioural and neuropathological impairments.

Machado-Joseph disease (MJD) is a dominantly inherited disorder originally described in people of Portuguese descent, and associated with the expansion of a CAG tract in the coding region of the causative gene MJD1/ATX3. The CAG repeats range from 10 to 51 in the normal population and from 55 to 87 in SCA3/MJD patients. MJD1 encodes ataxin-3, a protein whose physiological function has been linked to ubiquitin-mediated proteolysis. Despite the identification of the causative mutation, the pathogenic process leading to the neurodegeneration observed in the disease is not yet completely understood. In the past years, several studies identified different molecular mechanisms and cellular pathways as being impaired or deregulated in MJD. Autophagy, proteolysis or post-translational modifications, among other processes, were implicated in MJD pathogenesis. From these studies it was possible to identify new targets for therapeutic intervention, which in some cases proved successful in models of disease.