Abstract
Nephropathic cystinosis is a severe monogenic kidney disorder caused by mutations in CTNS, encoding the lysosomal transporter cystinosin, resulting in lysosomal cystine accumulation. The sole treatment, cysteamine, slows down the disease progression, but does not correct the established renal proximal tubulopathy. Here, we developed a new therapeutic strategy by applying omics to expand our knowledge on the complexity of the disease and prioritize drug targets in cystinosis. We identified alpha‐ketoglutarate as a potential metabolite to bridge cystinosin loss to autophagy, apoptosis and kidney proximal tubule impairment in cystinosis. This insight combined with a drug screen revealed a bicalutamide–cysteamine combination treatment as a novel dual‐target pharmacological approach for the phenotypical correction of cystinotic kidney proximal tubule cells, patient‐derived kidney tubuloids and cystinotic zebrafish.
Highlights
Nephropathic cystinosis is a severe monogenic kidney disorder caused by mutations in CTNS, encoding the lysosomal transporter cystinosin, resulting in lysosomal cystine accumulation
Our results revealed that a bicalutamide–cysteamine combination treatment could provide a novel pharmacological approach for the phenotypical correction of cystinosis
This was confirmed further by metabolic and proteomic analyses, where we found a reduction in lysosomal catabolic proteins and an upregulation of enzymatic antioxidizing agents such as catalase and superoxide dismutase in cystinotic cells, which was consistent with delayed lysosomal cargo degradation and increased oxidative stress, respectively
Summary
Nephropathic cystinosis is a severe monogenic kidney disorder caused by mutations in CTNS, encoding the lysosomal transporter cystinosin, resulting in lysosomal cystine accumulation. The sole treatment, cysteamine, slows down the disease progression, but does not correct the established renal proximal tubulopathy. We developed a new therapeutic strategy by applying omics to expand our knowledge on the complexity of the disease and prioritize drug targets in cystinosis. We identified alpha-ketoglutarate as a potential metabolite to bridge cystinosin loss to autophagy, apoptosis and kidney proximal tubule impairment in cystinosis. This insight combined with a drug screen revealed a bicalutamide– cysteamine combination treatment as a novel dual-target pharmacological approach for the phenotypical correction of cystinotic kidney proximal tubule cells, patient-derived kidney tubuloids and cystinotic zebrafish.
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