Progression of Behavioral and CNS Deficits in a Viable Murine Model of Chronic Neuronopathic Gaucher Disease

PLoS One. 2016 Sep 6;11(9):e0162367. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0162367. eCollection 2016.

Abstract

To study the neuronal deficits in neuronopathic Gaucher Disease (nGD), the chronological behavioral profiles and the age of onset of brain abnormalities were characterized in a chronic nGD mouse model (9V/null). Progressive accumulation of glucosylceramide (GC) and glucosylsphingosine (GS) in the brain of 9V/null mice were observed at as early as 6 and 3 months of age for GC and GS, respectively. Abnormal accumulation of α-synuclein was present in the 9V/null brain as detected by immunofluorescence and Western blot analysis. In a repeated open-field test, the 9V/null mice (9 months and older) displayed significantly less environmental habituation and spent more time exploring the open-field than age-matched WT group, indicating the onset of short-term spatial memory deficits. In the marble burying test, the 9V/null group had a shorter latency to initiate burying activity at 3 months of age, whereas the latency increased significantly at ≥12 months of age; 9V/null females buried significantly more marbles to completion than the WT group, suggesting an abnormal response to the instinctive behavior and an abnormal activity in non-associative anxiety-like behavior. In the conditional fear test, only the 9V/null males exhibited a significant decrease in response to contextual fear, but both genders showed less response to auditory-cued fear compared to age- and gender-matched WT at 12 months of age. These results indicate hippocampus-related emotional memory defects. Abnormal gait emerged in 9V/null mice with wider front-paw and hind-paw widths, as well as longer stride in a gender-dependent manner with different ages of onset. Significantly higher liver- and spleen-to-body weight ratios were detected in 9V/null mice with different ages of onsets. These data provide temporal evaluation of neurobehavioral dysfunctions and brain pathology in 9V/null mice that can be used for experimental designs to evaluate novel therapies for nGD.

MeSH terms

  • Acoustic Stimulation
  • Aging / genetics
  • Aging / pathology*
  • Animals
  • Behavior, Animal
  • Conditioning, Psychological / physiology
  • Disease Models, Animal
  • Disease Progression
  • Exploratory Behavior / physiology
  • Fear / physiology
  • Female
  • Gait / physiology
  • Gaucher Disease / metabolism
  • Gaucher Disease / pathology
  • Gaucher Disease / physiopathology*
  • Glucosylceramidase / deficiency
  • Glucosylceramidase / genetics*
  • Glucosylceramides / biosynthesis
  • Hippocampus / metabolism
  • Hippocampus / pathology
  • Hippocampus / physiopathology*
  • Male
  • Memory Disorders / metabolism
  • Memory Disorders / pathology
  • Memory Disorders / physiopathology*
  • Mice
  • Psychosine / analogs & derivatives
  • Psychosine / biosynthesis
  • Sex Factors
  • Spatial Memory / physiology
  • alpha-Synuclein / biosynthesis

Substances

  • Glucosylceramides
  • alpha-Synuclein
  • Psychosine
  • sphingosyl beta-glucoside
  • Glucosylceramidase