Reduced Cancer Incidence in Huntington's Disease: Analysis in the Registry Study

Background: People with Huntington’s disease (HD) have been observed to have lower rates of cancers. Objective: To investigate the relationship between age of onset of HD, CAG repeat length, and cancer diagnosis. Methods: Data were obtained from the European Huntington’s disease network REGISTRY study for 6540 subjects. Population cancer incidence was ascertained from the GLOBOCAN database to obtain standardised incidence ratios of cancers in the REGISTRY subjects. Results: 173/6528 HD REGISTRY subjects had had a cancer diagnosis. The age-standardised incidence rate of all cancers in the REGISTRY HD population was 0.26 (CI 0.22–0.30). Individual cancers showed a lower age-standardised incidence rate compared with the control population with prostate and colorectal cancers showing the lowest rates. There was no effect of CAG length on the likelihood of cancer, but a cancer diagnosis within the last year was associated with a greatly increased rate of HD onset (Hazard Ratio 18.94, p < 0.001). Conclusions: Cancer is less common than expected in the HD population, confirming previous reports. However, this does not appear to be related to CAG length in HTT. A recent diagnosis of cancer increases the risk of HD onset at any age, likely due to increased investigation following a cancer diagnosis

Identification of genetic variants associated with Huntington's disease progression: a genome-wide association study

Background Huntington's disease is caused by a CAG repeat expansion in the huntingtin gene, HTT. Age at onset has been used as a quantitative phenotype in genetic analysis looking for Huntington's disease modifiers, but is hard to define and not always available. Therefore, we aimed to generate a novel measure of disease progression and to identify genetic markers associated with this progression measure. Methods We generated a progression score on the basis of principal component analysis of prospectively acquired longitudinal changes in motor, cognitive, and imaging measures in the 218 indivduals in the TRACK-HD cohort of Huntington's disease gene mutation carriers (data collected 2008–11). We generated a parallel progression score using data from 1773 previously genotyped participants from the European Huntington's Disease Network REGISTRY study of Huntington's disease mutation carriers (data collected 2003–13). We did a genome-wide association analyses in terms of progression for 216 TRACK-HD participants and 1773 REGISTRY participants, then a meta-analysis of these results was undertaken. Findings Longitudinal motor, cognitive, and imaging scores were correlated with each other in TRACK-HD participants, justifying use of a single, cross-domain measure of disease progression in both studies. The TRACK-HD and REGISTRY progression measures were correlated with each other (r=0·674), and with age at onset (TRACK-HD, r=0·315; REGISTRY, r=0·234). The meta-analysis of progression in TRACK-HD and REGISTRY gave a genome-wide significant signal (p=1·12 × 10−10) on chromosome 5 spanning three genes: MSH3, DHFR, and MTRNR2L2. The genes in this locus were associated with progression in TRACK-HD (MSH3 p=2·94 × 10−8 DHFR p=8·37 × 10−7 MTRNR2L2 p=2·15 × 10−9) and to a lesser extent in REGISTRY (MSH3 p=9·36 × 10−4 DHFR p=8·45 × 10−4 MTRNR2L2 p=1·20 × 10−3). The lead single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) in TRACK-HD (rs557874766) was genome-wide significant in the meta-analysis (p=1·58 × 10−8), and encodes an aminoacid change (Pro67Ala) in MSH3. In TRACK-HD, each copy of the minor allele at this SNP was associated with a 0·4 units per year (95% CI 0·16–0·66) reduction in the rate of change of the Unified Huntington's Disease Rating Scale (UHDRS) Total Motor Score, and a reduction of 0·12 units per year (95% CI 0·06–0·18) in the rate of change of UHDRS Total Functional Capacity score. These associations remained significant after adjusting for age of onset. Interpretation The multidomain progression measure in TRACK-HD was associated with a functional variant that was genome-wide significant in our meta-analysis. The association in only 216 participants implies that the progression measure is a sensitive reflection of disease burden, that the effect size at this locus is large, or both. Knockout of Msh3 reduces somatic expansion in Huntington's disease mouse models, suggesting this mechanism as an area for future therapeutic investigation

HASH(0x559bb2fdfb48)

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CryoFISH: fluorescence in situ hybridization on ultrathin cryosections

The visualization of cellular structures and components has become an invaluable tool in biological and medical sciences. Imaging subcellular compartments and single molecules within a cell has prompted the development of a wide range of sample preparation techniques as well as various microscope devices to obtain images with increased spatial resolution. Here, we present cryoFISH, a method for fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) on thin (~150 nm thick) cryosections from sucrose-embedded fixed cells or tissues. CryoFISH can be used in combination with immunodetection (IF) of other cellular components. The main advantages of cryoFISH and cryoIF over whole-cell labeling methods are increased spatial resolution with confocal microscopy, greater sensitivity of detection due to increased probe accessibility, and better image contrast. CryoFISH and cryoIF methods typically used on samples fixed in conditions that preserve ultrastructure, are compatible with the labeling of cells in their tissue context and are ideal for correlative studies that compare fluorescence with electron microscopy

Stable morphology, but dynamic internal reorganisation, of interphase human chromosomes in living cells

Despite the distinctive structure of mitotic chromosomes, it has not been possible to visualise individual chromosomes in living interphase cells, where chromosomes spend over 90% of their time. Studies of interphase chromosome structure and dynamics use fluorescence in-situ hybridisation (FISH) on fixed cells, which potentially damages structure and loses dynamic information. We have developed a new methodology, involving photoactivation of labelled histone H3 at mitosis, to visualise individual and specific human chromosomes in living interphase cells. Our data revealed bulk chromosome volume and morphology are established rapidly after mitosis, changing only incrementally after the first hour of G1. This contrasted with the behaviour of specific loci on labelled chromosomes, which showed more progressive reorganisation, and revealed that “looping out” of chromatin from chromosome territories is a dynamic state. We measured considerable heterogeneity in chromosome decondensation, even between sister chromatids, which may reflect local structural impediments to decondensation and could potentially amplify transcriptional noise. Chromosome structure showed tremendous resistance to inhibitors of transcription, histone deacetylation and chromatin remodelling. Together, these data indicate steric constraints determine structure, rather than innate chromosome architecture or function-driven anchoring, with interphase chromatin organisation governed primarily by opposition between needs for decondensation and the space available for this to happen