Systematic comparison of the effects of alpha-synuclein mutations on its oligomerization and aggregation.

Aggregation of alpha-synuclein (ASYN) in Lewy bodies and Lewy neurites is the typical pathological hallmark of Parkinson's disease (PD) and other synucleinopathies. Furthermore, mutations in the gene encoding for ASYN are associated with familial and sporadic forms of PD, suggesting this protein plays a central role in the disease. However, the precise contribution of ASYN to neuronal dysfunction and death is unclear. There is intense debate about the nature of the toxic species of ASYN and little is known about the molecular determinants of oligomerization and aggregation of ASYN in the cell. In order to clarify the effects of different mutations on the propensity of ASYN to oligomerize and aggregate, we assembled a panel of 19 ASYN variants and compared their behaviour. We found that familial mutants linked to PD (A30P, E46K, H50Q, G51D and A53T) exhibited identical propensities to oligomerize in living cells, but had distinct abilities to form inclusions. While the A30P mutant reduced the percentage of cells with inclusions, the E46K mutant had the opposite effect. Interestingly, artificial proline mutants designed to interfere with the helical structure of the N-terminal domain, showed increased propensity to form oligomeric species rather than inclusions. Moreover, lysine substitution mutants increased oligomerization and altered the pattern of aggregation. Altogether, our data shed light into the molecular effects of ASYN mutations in a cellular context, and established a common ground for the study of genetic and pharmacological modulators of the aggregation process, opening new perspectives for therapeutic intervention in PD and other synucleinopathies.

Secondary-ion mass spectrometry of genetically encoded targets.

Secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) is generally used in imaging the isotopic composition of various materials. It is becoming increasingly popular in biology, especially for investigations of cellular metabolism. However, individual proteins are difficult to identify in SIMS, which limits the ability of this technology to study individual compartments or protein complexes. We present a method for specific protein isotopic and fluorescence labeling (SPILL), based on a novel click reaction with isotopic probes. Using this method, we added (19) F-enriched labels to different proteins, and visualized them by NanoSIMS and fluorescence microscopy. The (19) F signal allowed the precise visualization of the protein of interest, with minimal background, and enabled correlative studies of protein distribution and cellular metabolism or composition. SPILL can be applied to biological systems suitable for click chemistry, which include most cell-culture systems, as well as small model organisms.

The reserve pool of synaptic vesicles acts as a buffer for proteins involved in synaptic vesicle recycling.

Presynaptic nerve terminals contain between several hundred vesicles (for example in small CNS synapses) and several tens of thousands (as in neuromuscular junctions). Although it has long been assumed that such high numbers of vesicles are required to sustain neurotransmission during conditions of high demand, we found that activity in vivo requires the recycling of only a few percent of the vesicles. However, the maintenance of large amounts of reserve vesicles in many evolutionarily distinct species suggests that they are relevant for synaptic function. We suggest here that these vesicles constitute buffers for soluble accessory proteins involved in vesicle recycling, preventing their loss into the axon. Supporting this hypothesis, we found that vesicle clusters contain a large variety of proteins needed for vesicle recycling, but without an obvious function within the clusters. Disrupting the clusters by application of black widow spider venom resulted in the diffusion of numerous soluble proteins into the axons. Prolonged stimulation and ionomycin application had a similar effect, suggesting that calcium influx causes the unbinding of soluble proteins from vesicles. Confirming this hypothesis, we found that isolated synaptic vesicles in vitro sequestered soluble proteins from the cytosol in a process that was inhibited by calcium addition. We conclude that the reserve vesicles support neurotransmission indirectly, ensuring that soluble recycling proteins are delivered upon demand during synaptic activity.

A small pool of vesicles maintains synaptic activity in vivo.

Chemical synapses contain substantial numbers of neurotransmitter-filled synaptic vesicles, ranging from approximately 100 to many thousands. The vesicles fuse with the plasma membrane to release neurotransmitter and are subsequently reformed and recycled. Stimulation of synapses in vitro generally causes the majority of the synaptic vesicles to release neurotransmitter, leading to the assumption that synapses contain numerous vesicles to sustain transmission during high activity. We tested this assumption by an approach we termed cellular ethology, monitoring vesicle function in behaving animals (10 animal models, nematodes to mammals). Using FM dye photooxidation, pHluorin imaging, and HRP uptake we found that only approximately 1-5% of the vesicles recycled over several hours, in both CNS synapses and neuromuscular junctions. These vesicles recycle repeatedly, intermixing slowly (over hours) with the reserve vesicles. The latter can eventually release when recycling is inhibited in vivo but do not seem to participate under normal activity. Vesicle recycling increased only to ≈ 5% in animals subjected to an extreme stress situation (frog predation on locusts). Synapsin, a molecule binding both vesicles and the cytoskeleton, may be a marker for the reserve vesicles: the proportion of vesicles recycling in vivo increased to 30% in synapsin-null Drosophila. We conclude that synapses do not require numerous reserve vesicles to sustain neurotransmitter release and thus may use them for other purposes, examined in the accompanying paper.

Revisiting synaptic vesicle pool localization in the Drosophila neuromuscular junction.

The synaptic vesicles are organized in distinct populations or 'pools': the readily releasable pool (the first vesicles released upon stimulation), the recycling pool (which maintains release under moderate stimulation) and the reserve pool (which is called into action only upon strong, often unphysiological stimulation). A major question in the field is whether the pools consist of biochemically different vesicles or whether the pool tag is a spatial one (with the recycling vesicles found next to the release sites, and the reserve ones farther away). A strong and stable spatial segregation has been proposed in the last decade in the Drosophila larval neuromuscular junction--albeit based solely on light microscopy experiments. We have tested here this hypothesis using electron microscopy (EM) photoconversion. We found the recycling and reserve pools to be thoroughly intermixed at the EM level, indicating that spatial location is irrelevant for the functional properties of the vesicle.

Super-resolution Microscopy of Clickable Amino Acids Reveals the Effects of Fluorescent Protein Tagging on Protein Assemblies.

The advent of super-resolution microscopy (nanoscopy) has set high standards for fluorescence tagging. Fluorescent proteins (FPs) are convenient tags in conventional imaging, but their use in nanoscopy has been questioned due to their relatively large size and propensity to form multimers. Here, we compared the nanoscale organization of proteins with or without FP tags by introducing the unnatural amino acid propargyl-L-lysine (PRK) in 26 proteins known to form multimolecular arrangements and into their FP-tagged variants. We revealed the proteins by coupling synthetic fluorophores to PRK via click chemistry and visualized them using ground-state depletion microscopy followed by individual molecule return, as well as stimulated emission depletion microscopy. The arrangements formed by the FP-tagged and nontagged proteins were similar. Mild, but statistically significant differences were observed for only six proteins (23% of all proteins tested). This suggests that FP-based nanoscopy is generally reliable. Unnatural amino acids should be a reliable alternative for the few proteins that are sensitive to FP tagging.

A contamination-insensitive probe for imaging specific biomolecules by secondary ion mass spectrometry.

Imaging techniques should differentiate between specific signals, from the biomolecules of interest, and non-specific signals, from the background. We present a probe containing (15)N and (14)N isotopes in approximately equal proportion, for secondary ion mass spectrometry imaging. This probe designed for a precise biomolecule analysis is insensitive to background signals.

Correlated optical and isotopic nanoscopy.

The isotopic composition of different materials can be imaged by secondary ion mass spectrometry. In biology, this method is mainly used to study cellular metabolism and turnover, by pulsing the cells with marker molecules such as amino acids labelled with stable isotopes ((15)N, (13)C). The incorporation of the markers is then imaged with a lateral resolution that can surpass 100 nm. However, secondary ion mass spectrometry cannot identify specific subcellular structures like organelles, and needs to be correlated with a second technique, such as fluorescence imaging. Here, we present a method based on stimulated emission depletion microscopy that provides correlated optical and isotopic nanoscopy (COIN) images. We use this approach to study the protein turnover in different organelles from cultured hippocampal neurons. Correlated optical and isotopic nanoscopy can be applied to a variety of biological samples, and should therefore enable the investigation of the isotopic composition of many organelles and subcellular structures.

Composition of isolated synaptic boutons reveals the amounts of vesicle trafficking proteins.

Synaptic vesicle recycling has long served as a model for the general mechanisms of cellular trafficking. We used an integrative approach, combining quantitative immunoblotting and mass spectrometry to determine protein numbers; electron microscopy to measure organelle numbers, sizes, and positions; and super-resolution fluorescence microscopy to localize the proteins. Using these data, we generated a three-dimensional model of an "average" synapse, displaying 300,000 proteins in atomic detail. The copy numbers of proteins involved in the same step of synaptic vesicle recycling correlated closely. In contrast, copy numbers varied over more than three orders of magnitude between steps, from about 150 copies for the endosomal fusion proteins to more than 20,000 for the exocytotic ones.