Editing of Parkinson’s disease mutation in patient-derived iPSCs by zinc-finger nucleases

The goal of this proposal is to establish a novel research tool to explore the molecular basis of Parkinson’s disease (PD) - a critical step toward the development of new therapy. To date, a small handful of specific genes and associated mutations have been causally linked to the development of PD. However, how these mutations provoke the degeneration of specific neurons in the brain remains poorly understood. Moreover, conducting such genotype-phenotype studies has been hampered by two significant experimental problems. First, we have historically lacked the ability to model the relevant human cell types carrying the appropriate gene mutation. Second, the genetic variation between individuals means that the comparison of a cell from a disease-carrier to a cell derived from a normal subject is confounded by the many thousands of genetic changes that normally differentiate two individuals from one another. Here we propose to combine two powerful techniques – one genetic and one cellular – to overcome these barriers and drive a detailed understanding of the molecular basis of PD. Specifically, we propose to use zinc finger nucleases (ZFNs) in patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) to accelerate the generation of a panel of genetically identical cell lines differing only in the presence or absence of a single disease-linked gene mutation. iPSCs have the potential to differentiate into many cell types – including dopaminergic neurons that become defective in PD. Merging these two technologies will thus allow us to study activity of either the wild-type or the mutant gene product in cells derived from the same individual, which is critical for elucidating the function of these disease-related genes and mutations. We anticipate that the generation of these isogenic cells will accelerate our understanding of the molecular causes of PD, and that such cellular models could become important tools for developing novel therapies.