Abstract
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease, often linked to mutations in the FUS gene, leading to toxic protein aggregates. This study investigates the role of HSP70, a molecular chaperone, in mitigating neurodegeneration in FUS-ALS mouse models. Using quantitative immunofluorescence microscopy, we mapped cellular changes in the primary motor cortex of double transgenic FUS/HSP70 mice and compared them to single FUS-transgenic controls. Our results reveal that double transgenic mice exhibit significantly reduced neuronal damage and increased levels of mature neuronal (NeuN) and microglial (Iba1) markers, indicating a protective effect of HSP70. Intracellular HSP70 expression proved more effective than extracellular release, suggesting that targeted HSP70 delivery to neurons may offer a promising therapeutic avenue for ALS. This study underscores the potential of quantitative immunofluorescence for mapping neuroprotective pathways and highlights HSP70’s impact on mitigating FUS-related pathology in ALS.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 11614 |
Number of pages | 14 |
Journal | Applied Sciences |
Volume | 14 |
Issue number | 24 |
Early online date | 12 Dec 2024 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Dec 2024 |
Bibliographical note
Copyright © 2024 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).Keywords
- heat shock proteins
- HSP70
- HSPA1A
- neurodegeneration
- primary motor cortex
- amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
- ALS
- fused in sarcoma
- FUS
- transgenic animals
- immunofluorescence
- microscopy