Hosting neurotoxicity in polyglutamine disease.

Polyglutamine diseases are caused by an expanded glutamine domain thought to confer a toxic activity onto the respective disease proteins. In this issue, propose that toxicity of the polyglutamine protein Ataxin-1 may not be due to abberant protein interactions mediated by the polyglutamine expansion. Instead, they suggest that toxicity is solely due to interactions of Ataxin-1 with its normal binding partners.