Anomalous protein-DNA interactions behind neurological disorders

Abstract

Aggregation, nuclear location, and nucleic acid interaction are common features shared by a number of proteins related to neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, transmissible spongiform encephalopathy, Huntington's disease, spinobulbar muscular atrophy, dentatorubro-pallidoluysian atrophy, and several spinocerebellar ataxias. β-Amyloid peptides, tau protein, α-synuclein, superoxide dismutase1, prion protein, huntingtin, atrophin1, androgen receptor, and several ataxins are proteins prone to becoming aggregated, to translocate inside cell nucleus, and to bind DNA. In this chapter, we review those common features suggesting that neurological diseases too may share a transcriptional disorder, making it an important contribution to the origin of the disease.