Journal
SCIENTIFIC REPORTS
Volume 10, Issue 1, Pages -Publisher
NATURE RESEARCH
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-66497-6
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Funding
- Italian Ministry of Education University and Research (MIUR), PRIN 2015 [2015FNWP34]
- Fondazione con il Sud [2011PDR-13]
- Telethon Core program grant
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The presence of alpha -synuclein aggregates in the retina of Parkinson's disease patients has been associated with vision impairment. In this study we sought to determine the effects of alpha -synuclein overexpression on the survival and function of dopaminergic amacrine cells (DACs) in the retina. Adult mice were intravitreally injected with an adeno-associated viral (AAV) vector to overexpress human wild-type alpha -synuclein in the inner retina. Before and after systemic injections of levodopa (L-DOPA), retinal responses and visual acuity-driven behavior were measured by electroretinography (ERG) and a water maze task, respectively. Amacrine cells and ganglion cells were counted at different time points after the injection. alpha -synuclein overexpression led to an early loss of DACs associated with a decrease of light-adapted ERG responses and visual acuity that could be rescued by systemic injections of L-DOPA. The data show that alpha -synuclein overexpression affects dopamine neurons in the retina. The approach provides a novel accessible method to model the underlying mechanisms implicated in the pathogenesis of synucleinopathies and for testing novel treatments.
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