P.16.12 OPMD from the myoblast’s and fibroblast’s point of view

Abstract

Oculopharyngeal muscular dystrophy (OPMD) is a late onset autosomal dominant inherited dystrophy due to an expansion of GCG repeats in the coding region of the ubiquitously expressed PABPN1 gene. The main muscular targets of OPMD are cricopharyngeal muscle (CPM) and elevator eyelid muscle whose progressive involvement leads to dysphagia and ptosis. We have recently demonstrated that OPMD CPM is characterized by atrophy, fibrosis and increased PAX7-positive cells compared to control CPM and to OPMD non-affected muscles such as quadriceps (QM). These results suggest that the specific involvement of affected muscles in OPMD correlates with an exacerbated fibrosis and a failure of the regenerative response. This led us to further study the skeletal muscle progenitor cells from CPM and their possible deregulation in OPMD. In vitro, primary cultures isolated from CPM biopsies of both OPMD (n = 4) and control (n = 4) subjects were characterized by a rapid fall of their myogenicity, whereas in primary cultures from control QM (n = 3) the myogenicity was maintained throughout the course of the lifespan. Several hypotheses for this drastic loss of myogenicity have been investigated, e.g. proliferative deregulation between resident fibroblasts and myoblasts. In addition, CPM cells regeneration capacity was explored in vivo. Each primary culture was injected into cryodamaged tibialis anterior (TA) muscle of an immunodeficient mouse model. One month after injection, a high number of human PAX7-positive satellite cells were found in TA muscles injected with CPM myoblasts compared to control injected QM myoblasts. Moreover, an elevated number of human cells were revealed in the interstitial space of TA muscle injected by CPM myoblasts. Altogether, these results show that muscle primary cultures represent a good model to further study the deregulations observed in OPMD CPM. Cellular and molecular mechanisms deregulated in both fibroblasts and myoblasts fractions are now being investigated.