Environmental Impact on the Epigenetic Mechanisms Underlying Parkinson's Disease Pathogenesis: A Narrative Review

Abstract

Parkinson's disease (PD) is the second most common neurodegenerative disorder with an unclear etiology and no disease-modifying treatment to date. PD is considered a multifactorial disease, since both genetic and environmental factors contribute to its pathogenesis, although the molecular mechanisms linking these two key disease modifiers remain obscure. In this context, epigenetic mechanisms that alter gene expression without affecting the DNA sequence through DNA methylation, histone post-transcriptional modifications, and non-coding RNAs may represent the key mediators of the genetic-environmental interactions underlying PD pathogenesis. Environmental exposures may cause chemical alterations in several cellular functions, including gene expression. Emerging evidence has highlighted that smoking, coffee consumption, pesticide exposure, and heavy metals (manganese, arsenic, lead, etc.) may potentially affect the risk of PD development at least partially via epigenetic modifications. Herein, we discuss recent accumulating pre-clinical and clinical evidence of the impact of lifestyle and environmental factors on the epigenetic mechanisms underlying PD development, aiming to shed more light on the pathogenesis and stimulate future research.

Keywords: DNA methylation; Parkinson disease; coffee; diagnosis; environmental toxins; epigenetics; histone modifications; lcRNAs; pesticides; smoking.

Figure 1

Epigenetic mechanisms regulating the pathogenesis of Parkinson’s disease.

Figure 2

Schematic representation of the potential impact of environmental factors on epigenetic modifications in PD.