Loss of parkin function is linked to autosomal recessive juvenile parkinsonism. Here we show that proteotoxic stress and short C-terminal truncations induce misfolding of parkin. As a consequence, wild-type parkin was depleted from a high molecular weight complex and inactivated by aggregation. Similarly, the pathogenic parkin mutant W453Stop, characterized by a Cterminal deletion of 13 amino acids, spontaneously adopted a misfolded conformation. Mutational analysis indicated that C-terminal truncations exceeding 3 amino acids abolished formation of detergent-soluble parkin. In the cytosol scattered aggregates of misfolded parkin contained the molecular chaperone Hsp70. Moreover, increased expression of chaperones prevented aggregation of wild-type parkin and promoted folding of the W453Stop mutant. Analyzing parkin folding in vitro indicated that parkin is aggregation-prone and that its folding is dependent on chaperones. Our study demonstrates that C-terminal truncations impede parkin folding and reveal a new mechanism for inactivation of parkin.Autosomal recessive juvenile parkinsonism (AR-JP), 1 the major cause of early onset parkinsonism, is characterized by mutations within the parkin gene. Parkin, a 465-amino acid protein, shows homology to ubiquitin at the N terminus and harbors a RING box near the C terminus, consisting of two RING finger motifs that flank a cysteine-rich domain (in-between RING fingers domain) (1, 2). Functional studies established that parkin acts as a ubiquitin-protein isopeptide ligase and that pathogenic mutations compromise this activity (3-6). As a consequence, substrates destined for proteasomal degradation via parkin might accumulate in parkin-deficient cells. Indeed, recent studies with cell culture models provide experimental evidence for such a scenario. It was shown that disease-related mutations in the parkin gene impair protein interactions of parkin with either a parkin substrate or another component of the ubiquitin ligase complex. Accumulation of Pael-R, one of the identified parkin substrates, causes endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress, indicating that parkin has the potential to suppress unfolded protein stress-induced cell death (3, 4). Recent studies (7) revealed that parkin deficiency potentiates the accumulation of cyclin E and promotes apoptosis in neuronal cells exposed to excitotoxic stress. Interestingly, parkin is a significant component of Lewy bodies, the histopathologic hallmark of PD (5,8,9). Furthermore, it has been shown that parkin is protective against the toxic effects of proteasomal dysfunction and mutant ␣-synuclein (10), implying that the impact of parkin function and dysfunction might not be restricted to the entity of AR-JP.It still remains enigmatic why dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra are highly vulnerable in AR-JP, as parkin as well as its substrates identified so far are not selectively expressed in these cells. However, an inherent feature of dopaminergic neurons is an elevated level of reactive oxygen and nitrogen species due to...