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Dominant ACO2 mutations are a frequent cause of isolated optic atrophy

Charif, M; Gueguen, N; Ferré, M; Elkarhat, Z; Khiati, S; LeMao, M; Chevrollier, A; ... Lenaers, G; + view all (2021) Dominant ACO2 mutations are a frequent cause of isolated optic atrophy. Brain Communications , 3 (2) , Article fcab063. 10.1093/braincomms/fcab063. Green open access

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Abstract

Biallelic mutations in ACO2, encoding the mitochondrial aconitase 2, have been identified in individuals with neurodegenerative syndromes, including infantile cerebellar retinal degeneration and recessive optic neuropathies (locus OPA9). By screening European cohorts of individuals with genetically unsolved inherited optic neuropathies, we identified 61 cases harbouring variants in ACO2, among whom 50 carried dominant mutations, emphasizing for the first time the important contribution of ACO2 monoallelic pathogenic variants to dominant optic atrophy. Analysis of the ophthalmological and clinical data revealed that recessive cases are affected more severely than dominant cases, while not significantly earlier. In addition, 27% of the recessive cases and 11% of the dominant cases manifested with extraocular features in addition to optic atrophy. In silico analyses of ACO2 variants predicted their deleterious impacts on ACO2 biophysical properties. Skin derived fibroblasts from patients harbouring dominant and recessive ACO2 mutations revealed a reduction of ACO2 abundance and enzymatic activity, and the impairment of the mitochondrial respiration using citrate and pyruvate as substrates, while the addition of other Krebs cycle intermediates restored a normal respiration, suggesting a possible short-cut adaptation of the tricarboxylic citric acid cycle. Analysis of the mitochondrial genome abundance disclosed a significant reduction of the mitochondrial DNA amount in all ACO2 fibroblasts. Overall, our data position ACO2 as the third most frequently mutated gene in autosomal inherited optic neuropathies, after OPA1 and WFS1, and emphasize the crucial involvement of the first steps of the Krebs cycle in the maintenance and survival of retinal ganglion cells.

Type: Article
Title: Dominant ACO2 mutations are a frequent cause of isolated optic atrophy
Location: England
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1093/braincomms/fcab063
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1093/braincomms/fcab063
Language: English
Additional information: © The Author(s) (2021). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Guarantors of Brain. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Keywords: ACO2, Krebs cycle, aconitase 2, mitochondria, optic neuropathy
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Institute of Ophthalmology
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10129233
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