PD-MitoQUANT research at DZNE and CNRS Published in Cell

“Microglia jointly degrade fibrillar alpha-synuclein cargo by distribution through tunneling nanotubes,” a published research study conducted by the team of  Hannah Scheiblich, Cira Dansokho, Dilek Mercan, Susanne V. Schmidt, Luc Bousset, Lena Wischhof, Frederik Eikens, Alexandru Odainic, Jasper Spitzer, Angelika Griep, Stephanie Schwartz, Daniele Bano, Eicke Latz, Ronald Melki, and Michael T. Heneka appeared in the journal. Cell, (ISSN: 0092-8674, Vol: 0, Issue: 0 (2021)) on September 22nd, 2021.

To break down toxic proteins more quickly, immune cells in the brain can join together to form networks when needed. However, in certain mutations that can cause Parkinson’s disease, this cooperation is impaired. This collaborative body of work with Michael Heneka’s group shows that microglia share the burden of fibrillar a-synuclein through the directed transfer of the fibrils from affected to naive cells and mitochondria from naive to affected cells.

Our partners, Prof. Ronald Melki at CNRS and Prof. Daniele Bano at DZNE acknowledge PD-MitoQUANT research and IMI support in this publication. The findings are published in the renowned journal Cell.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2021.09.007 Download the pdf here.