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Huntington’s disease (HD) is an autosomal dominant neurodegenerative disorder of the central nervous system (CNS) that is defined by a CAG expansion in exon 1 of the huntingtin gene leading to the production of mutant huntingtin (mHtt). To date, the disease pathophysiology has been thought to be primarily driven by cell-autonomous mechanisms, but, here, we demonstrate that fibroblasts derived from HD patients carrying either 72, 143 and 180 CAG repeats as well as induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) also characterized by 143 CAG repeats can transmit protein aggregates to genetically unrelated and healthy host tissue following implantation into the cerebral ventricles of neonatal mice in a non-cell-autonomous fashion. Transmitted mHtt aggregates gave rise to both motor and cognitive impairments, loss of striatal medium spiny neurons, increased inflammation and gliosis in associated brain regions, thereby recapitulating the behavioural and pathological phenotypes which characterizes HD. In addition, both in vitro work using co-cultures of mouse neural stem cells with 143 CAG fibroblasts and the SH-SY5Y human neuroblastoma cell line as well as in vivo experiments conducted in newborn wild-type mice suggest that exosomes can cargo mHtt between cells triggering the manifestation of HD-related behaviour and pathology. This is the first evidence of human-to-mouse prion-like propagation of mHtt in the mammalian brain; a finding which will help unravel the molecular bases of HD pathology as well as to lead to the development of a whole new range of therapies for neurodegenerative diseases of the CNS.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00401-016-1582-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Circulating endothelial progenitor cell (EPC) numbers and functions are reduced in migraine patients, suggesting that EPCs can be an underlying link between migraine and cardiovascular risk.

Huntington's disease (HD) is a devastating neurodegenerative disease caused by cytosine-adenine-guanine trinucleotide repeat expansion in the huntingtin gene. Growing evidence supports the regulatory functions of long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) in the disease process, but little is known about the association between lncRNAs and neuronal death in HD. Here, we evaluated the altered expression profiles of lncRNA in HD by using microarrays. Among dysregulated lncRNAs, we focused on the upregulation of nuclear paraspeckle assembly transcript 1 (NEAT1). Quantitative PCR analysis validated increased NEAT1 levels in the R6/2 mouse brain as well as the human HD postmortem brain. To determine the biological effects of NEAT1 on neuronal survival, neuro2A cells were transfected with the NEAT1 short isoform vector and were subjected to HO-induced injury. Subsequently, NEAT1-transfected cells showed increased viability under oxidative stress. Our observations support the notion that NEAT1 upregulation in HD contributes to the neuroprotective mechanism against neuronal injury rather than the pathological process underlying neurodegeneration in HD.

Collectively, ASC transplantation slowed striatal degeneration and behavioral deterioration of HD models, possibly via secreted factors.

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Objective Huntington’s disease (HD) is a genetic neurodegenerative disease that is caused by abnormal CAG expansion. Altered microRNA (miRNA) expression also causes abnormal gene regulation in this neurodegenerative disease. The delivery of abnormally downregulated miRNAs might restore normal gene regulation and have a therapeutic effect. Methods We developed an exosome-based delivery method to treat this neurodegenerative disease. miR-124, one of the key miRNAs that is repressed in HD, was stably overexpressed in a stable cell line. Exosomes were then harvested from these cells using an optimized protocol. The exosomes (Exo-124) exhibited a high level of miR-124 expression and were taken up by recipient cells. Results When Exo-124 was injected into the striatum of R6/2 transgenic HD mice, expression of the target gene, RE1-Silencing Transcription Factor, was reduced. However, Exo-124 treatment did not produce significant behavioral improvement. Conclusion This study serves as a proof of concept for exosome-based delivery of miRNA in neurodegenerative diseases.