Analysis of Expression of Genes CLN3, GABBR1, and WFS1 in Patients with Parkinson’s Disease

Abstract

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is one of the most common neurodegenerative pathologies. This disorder is associated with death of predominantly dopaminergic neurons. A characteristic feature of PD is a long latent period of disease development, which makes it impossible to investigate and diagnose PD at the earliest clinical stages. One of the approaches to solving this problem is the examination of the peripheral blood of untreated PD patients at the early clinical stages. Changes in relative mRNA levels of genes in peripheral blood can be considered as potential biomarkers at the early stages of PD. In this study, we analyzed changes in relative mRNA levels of genes CLN3, GABBR1, and WFS1 in peripheral blood in treated and untreated PD patients and in comparison groups using RT-qPCR with TaqMan probes. All the known functions of the proteins of the studied genes, as well as the identified associations of these genes with various neurological diseases, may indicate their possible involvement in PD pathogenesis. However, no statistically significant changes in mRNA levels in PD patients relative to the control were shown for any gene. No significant changes in relative mRNA levels in the neurological control group were shown either. So, the data presented in this paper suggest that genes CLN3, GABBR1, and WFS1 do not contribute to the pathogenesis of the disease, at least at the mRNA level, at the early symptomatic stages in patients with PD and, therefore, cannot be considered as biomarkers of the early stages of PD.