86. AAV9 Mediated Correction of Iduronate-2-Sulfatase Deficiency in the Central Nervous System to Prevent the Onset of Neurologic Deficits in a Murine Model of Mucopolysaccharidosis Type II

Abstract

Mucopolysaccharidosis type II (MPS II; Hunter Syndrome) is an X-linked recessive inherited lysosomal storage disease caused by deficiency of iduronate-2-sulfatase (IDS) and subsequent accumulation of glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) dermatan and heparan sulphate. Affected individuals exhibit a range in severity of manifestations such as organomegaly, skeletal dysplasias, cardiopulmonary obstruction, neurocognitive deficit, and shortened life expectancy. There is no cure for MPS II at the moment. Current standard of care is enzyme replacement therapy (ELAPSRASE; idursulfase), which is used to manage disease progression. However, enzyme replacement therapy (ERT) does not show neurologic improvement. As hematopoetic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) has not shown neurologic benefit for MPS II, there is currently no clinical recourse for patients exhibiting neurologic manifestations of this disease, and new therapies are desperately needed. We have been developing the use of AAV9 vectors for delivering the human IDS coding sequence (AAV9.hIDS) into the central nervous system of MPS II mice to restore IDS levels in the brain and prevent the emergence of neurocognitive deficits in the treated animals. A series of CMV-enhancer, beta actin-regulated vectors were generated that encode human IDS with or without the human sulfatase modifying factor-1 (SUMF-1), required for activation of the sulfatase active site. Three routes of administration; Intrathecal (IT), Intracerebroventricular (ICV) and Intravenous (IV) were used in these experiments. We found no significant difference in the enzyme level between mice that were treated with AAV9 vector transducing hIDS alone and mice that were treated with AAV9 vector encoding human IDS and SUMF-1, regardless of the route of administration. IT-administrated NOD. SCID (IDS Y+) and C57BL/6 (IDS Y+) did not show elevated IDS activity in the brain and spinal cord when compared to untreated animals, while plasma showed ten-fold higher (NOD. SCID) and 150-fold higher (C57BL/6) levels than untreated animals. IDS-deficient mice intravenously administered AAV9-hIDS exhibited IDS activities in all organs that were comparable to wild type. Moreover, the plasma of IV injected animals showed enzyme activity that was 100-fold higher than wild type. IDS-deficient mice administered AAV9-hIDUA intracerebroventricularly showed IDS activities comparable to wild type in most areas of the brain and peripheral tissues, while some portions of the brain showed two- to four-fold higher activity than wild type. Furthermore, IDS activity in plasma was 200-fold higher than wild type. Surprisingly, IDS enzyme activity in the plasma of all administrated animals showed persistence for at least 12 weeks post injection; therefore, IDS enzyme was not immunogenic at least on the C57BL/6 murine background. We also conducted additional neurobehavioral testing using the Barnes maze to differentiate neurocognitive deficits of untreated MPS II animals from that of wild type littermates. We found that the learning capability of affected animals is distinctively slower than that observed in littermates. Thus, Barnes maze will be used to address the benefit of these therapies in the MPS II murine model in future experiments. These results indicate potential of therapeutic benefit of AAV9 mediated human IDS gene transfer to the CNS to prevent neurologic deficiency in the MPS II.