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Modulation of the proteoglycan receptor PTPσ promotes recovery after spinal cord injury

Nature volume 518, pages 404–408 (2015)Cite this article

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Abstract

Contusive spinal cord injury leads to a variety of disabilities owing to limited neuronal regeneration and functional plasticity. It is well established that an upregulation of glial-derived chondroitin sulphate proteoglycans (CSPGs) within the glial scar and perineuronal net creates a barrier to axonal regrowth and sprouting1,2,3,4,5. Protein tyrosine phosphatase σ (PTPσ), along with its sister phosphatase leukocyte common antigen-related (LAR) and the nogo receptors 1 and 3 (NgR), have recently been identified as receptors for the inhibitory glycosylated side chains of CSPGs6,7,8. Here we find in rats that PTPσ has a critical role in converting growth cones into a dystrophic state by tightly stabilizing them within CSPG-rich substrates. We generated a membrane-permeable peptide mimetic of the PTPσ wedge domain that binds to PTPσ and relieves CSPG-mediated inhibition. Systemic delivery of this peptide over weeks restored substantial serotonergic innervation to the spinal cord below the level of injury and facilitated functional recovery of both locomotor and urinary systems. Our results add a new layer of understanding to the critical role of PTPσ in mediating the growth-inhibited state of neurons due to CSPGs within the injured adult spinal cord.

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Figure 1: Immobilization of growth cones within gradients of CSPG.
Figure 2: Identification and characterization of ISP.
Figure 3: Functional recovery after ISP treatment.
Figure 4: Anatomical changes after ISP treatment.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke grant NS025713 (J.S.); the Case Western Reserve University Council to Advance Human Health; P. Jing, R. Senior and S. Poon; Unite to Fight Paralysis; The Brumagin Memorial Fund; Spinal Cord Injury Sucks; United Paralysis Foundation; and The Kaneko Family Fund. The authors thank J. Flanagan, M. Blackmore, A. Filous, S. Brady-Kalnay, R. Gardner and B. Habecker for their valuable discussion and input into the project.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Neurosciences, Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, Cleveland, 44106, Ohio, USA

    Bradley T. Lang, Jared M. Cregg, Marc A. DePaul, Amanda P. Tran, Kathryn M. Madalena, Sarah A. Busch & Jerry Silver

  2. Department of Neuroscience, Center for Brain and Spinal Cord Repair, Wexner Medical Center at The Ohio State University, Columbus, 43210, Ohio, USA

    Kui Xu & Yingjie Shen

  3. Regenerative Medicine Program and Department of Physiology, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba R3E 0J9, Canada,

    Scott M. Dyck & Soheila Karimi-Abdolrezaee

  4. Baldwin Wallace University, Berea, 44017, Ohio, USA

    Benjamin P. Brown

  5. Institute for Cell Engineering, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, 21205, Maryland, USA

    Yi-Lan Weng

  6. Shriners Hospital’s Pediatric Research Center (Center for Neural Repair and Rehabilitation), Temple University School of Medicine, Philadelphia, 19140, Pennsylvania, USA

    Shuxin Li

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Contributions

B.T.L. performed all in vitro experiments, time-lapse microscopy, ISP treatments, immunohistochemistry and data quantification. B.T.L., J.M.C. and Y.L.W. designed the peptides. M.A.D. and A.T. performed all surgical procedures. B.T.L., M.A.D., K.M.M. and A.T. performed behavioural testing. A.T., B.P.B. and K.X. helped perform the pulldowns. S.M.D. and S.K.-A. performed the CSPG signalling experiments. Y.S., S.K.-A., S.L. and S.A.B. contributed to experimental design and figure preparation. B.T.L. and J.S. designed all studies, analysed the data and wrote the paper. All authors discussed and helped prepare the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jerry Silver.

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Competing interests

A preliminary patent application (61/621,623) has been filed for ISP.

Extended data figures and tables

Extended Data Figure 1 CSPG receptors LAR and NgR in vitro and PTPσ in vivo.

a, LAR expression in motile (left, on laminin) and immobilized (right, within CSPG gradient) growth cones. b, Nogo receptors in a soma and axons. Scale bars, 20 μm. c, d, PTPσ expression in the spinal cord 14 days after dorsal column crush injury. The arrowhead pointing upwards represents a labelled structure with dystrophic morphology. Scale bar, 50 μm.

Extended Data Figure 2 LAR structure, sequence alignment and pulldown analysis.

a, BLAST alignment of the known sequences of mouse, rat and human LAR, PTPσ, PTPδ and PTPμ. The wedge domain of each protein is aligned within the box. b, The tandem intracellular phosphatase domains of human LAR with the previously characterized wedge domain (red)14. c, d, Pulldown of recombinant PTPσ with biotinylated (b)ISP or ILP. e, f, Eluted lysate after pulldown was probed with antibodies against either LAR or pan-NgRs. Input is 10% lysate control.

Extended Data Figure 3 Astrocyte and satellite cell response to ISP and the adhesion assay.

a, Purified GFAP-positive mature astrocytes (green) did not respond to ISP. b, S100-positive satellite glia were able to cross the gradient of CSPG after ISP treatment. Scale bar, 50 μm. c, d, Response of neurons and axons upon a CSPG-rich substrate to agitation after ISP treatment. Scale bar, 50 μm.

Extended Data Figure 4 CSPG and ISP regulation of Erk1/2.

Western blot analysis revealed a significant decrease in the phosphorylation ratio of Erk1/2 in SH-SY5Y cells plated on laminin (2 μg ml−1) plus CSPGs (15 μg ml−1) compared with laminin-only substrates, which was reversed by either pre-treatment with ChABC (0.1 U ml−1) or 4 days of ISP treatment (2.5 μM). pErk1/2, phosphorylated Erk1/2; tErk1/2, total Erk1/2. Data normalized to laminin control. N = 4 independent experiments. *P < 0.05 versus all other conditions, one-way ANOVA, Tukey’s post-hoc test.

Extended Data Figure 5 FITC-ISP in vivo and infinite horizon impaction.

a, b, Spinal cord 1 h after subcutaneous injections of FITC-ISP or vehicle. Scale bar, 100 µM. c, Experimental design and timeline for in vivo experiment. d, e, The force and impaction velocity of all animals that received an infinite horizon contusive injury. All impactions are within 10% from the target force of 250 kdyn, with an average force of 258.2 for both ISP and vehicle.

Extended Data Figure 6 Metabolic cage analysis at 6 weeks after injury.

a, b, Void frequency and average void volume at 6 weeks after injury. n = 11 naive, 21 vehicle, 10 ILP and 26 ISP. c–h, Representative smoothed metabolic cage traces of a normal animal (c) and five treated animals (vehicle (d), ILP (e) and ISP (f, h) 12 weeks after injury. Void volume is plotted (in ml) as a function of time. Scale bar, 4 h.

Extended Data Figure 7 Additional behavioural data and analyses.

a, b, Average response to thermal (Hargrave’s test) and mechanical (Von Frey test) stimuli at 12 weeks after injury (n = 11 naive, 21 vehicle, 10 ILP and 26 ISP for thermal, n = 10 vehicle, 4 ILP and 10 ISP for mechanical). c–e, Correlations between recovery of each individual motor behaviour in the ISP treatment group. f–h, For each behaviour, the ISP-treated animals that recovered to two standard deviations relative to vehicle mean were separated and plotted as ‘responders’ while those that did not were plotted as ‘non-responders’. The n for the responding and non-responding group for each behaviour is listed on the graph. i, An in vivo ISP dose–response plot in a single cohort of animals. A dose-dependent increase occurred in void frequency at 12 weeks after SCI.

Extended Data Figure 8 Five repetitions of in vivo experiments.

a–c, The individual results of five repeats of in vivo experiments are plotted as individual cohorts of animals for BBB, gridwalk and void frequency. *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, repeated measures two-way ANOVA, Tukey’s post-hoc test (BBB); one-way ANOVA, Kruskal–Wallis post-hoc test (gridwalk and void frequency). Black indicates ISP versus control; red indicates ISP versus ILP. n for each condition is listed.

Extended Data Figure 9 Correlation between spared tissue and behavioural recovery.

a–l, Spared tissue volume (as measured by GFAP-positive tissue) or area of spared white matter at the epicentre (as measured by eriochrome cyanine staining) were plotted against behavioural scores for vehicle- (a–f) and ISP-treated (g–l) animals. Pearson’s correlation coefficient (r value) is reported for each comparison. Only animals whose spinal cord was processed and cut coronally were included in the analysis.

Extended Data Figure 10 Neurofilament staining at lumbar levels.

a–f, Representative caudal neurofilament expression in lumbar spinal cord. Responders are ISP animals that demonstrated functional improvement (see Fig. 3n). All images were taken using identical settings. Scale bar, 500 μm.

Supplementary information

Adult sensory neuron growth cones on laminin substrate

Time lapse microscopy of motile, highly dynamic growth cones on a uniform substrate of laminin (10μg/ml) at 5d in vitro. Image taken every 30 sec. (MOV 28700 kb)

Adult sensory neuron growth cones within the CSPG gradient

Time lapse microscopy of growth cones stabilizing and immobilized within a gradient of CSPG at 5d in vitro. Image taken every 30 sec. (MOV 28099 kb)

Adult sensory neuron growth cones within the CSPG gradient

Time lapse microscopy of growth cones immobilized and over-adhered within a gradient of CSPG at 5d in vitro. Note that collapsed growth cones can involute into blebs, which are then transported retrogradely (part 1). 22 of the 24 growth cones analyzed at 4-6 d in vitro were partially or completely immobilized within the gradient. Image taken every 30 sec. (MOV 24668 kb)

Adult sensory neuron growth cones within the CSPG gradient following ISP or ILP treatment

Time lapse microscopy of adult DRG neurons which fail to immobilize and continually reform growth cones within the CSPG gradient following treatment with either ISP (2.5μM) or ILP (2.5μM) for 5d. Image taken every 30 sec. (MOV 29363 kb)

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Lang, B., Cregg, J., DePaul, M. et al. Modulation of the proteoglycan receptor PTPσ promotes recovery after spinal cord injury. Nature 518, 404–408 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature13974

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