Monitoring Cell-to-cell Transmission of Prion-like Protein Aggregates in Drosophila Melanogaster.

Protein aggregation is a central feature of most neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer's disease (AD), Parkinson's disease (PD), Huntington's disease (HD), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Protein aggregates are closely associated with neuropathology in these diseases, although the exact mechanism by which aberrant protein aggregation disrupts normal cellular homeostasis is not known. Emerging data provide strong support for the hypothesis that pathogenic aggregates in AD, PD, HD, and ALS have many similarities to prions, which are protein-only infectious agents responsible for the transmissible spongiform encephalopathies. Prions self-replicate by templating the conversion of natively-folded versions of the same protein, causing spread of the aggregation phenotype. How prions and prion-like proteins in AD, PD, HD, and ALS move from one cell to another is currently an area of intense investigation. Here, a Drosophila melanogaster model that permits monitoring of prion-like, cell-to-cell transmission of mutant huntingtin (Htt) aggregates associated with HD is described. This model takes advantage of powerful tools for manipulating transgene expression in many different Drosophila tissues and utilizes a fluorescently-tagged cytoplasmic protein to directly report prion-like transfer of mutant Htt aggregates. Importantly, the approach we describe here can be used to identify novel genes and pathways that mediate spreading of protein aggregates between diverse cell types in vivo. Information gained from these studies will expand the limited understanding of the pathogenic mechanisms that underlie neurodegenerative diseases and reveal new opportunities for therapeutic intervention.