Abstract
Skeletal muscle is a privileged target for long-term rAAV-mediated gene transfer in mouse, rat, dog and non-human primates. Intramuscular injections of rAAV encoding human factor IX in hemophilia B patients have been initiated, based on promising results gathered in affected dogs. We found that intramuscular rAAV administration in rats resulted in restricted transduction essentially along the myofibers axis with poor lateral diffusion. This suggested that the transduction rate might be limited by the ability of the virus to reach sites distant from the injection point. We tested whether hyaluronidase, an enzyme which dissociates the extracellular matrix, could enhance vector diffusion when injected in the rat muscle before administration of rAAV encoding either nuclear-localized β-galactosidase (rAAVCMVnlsLacZ) or the human α-1-antitrypsin (rAAVCMVhAAT) under the control of the cytomegalovirus immediate–early promoter (CMV). The results showed that pretreatment of the rat anterior tibialis muscle with hyaluronidase resulted in: (1) a larger diffusion of the virus indicated by an increase in the area containing LacZ-transduced fibers, and (2) a two- to three-fold increase of transduction efficiency measured by the number of LacZ-positive fibers or by the hAAT serum concentration. We also provide evidence that hyaluronidase was well tolerated and was not associated with short- or long-term toxicity evaluated by morphological studies. Finally, in our experimental conditions, hyaluronidase did not promote rAAV dissemination to other organs as assessed by PCR to detect vector sequences. We conclude that pretreament of skeletal muscle by hyaluronidase, a clinically available reagent, was harmless and resulted in a consistent and significant increase in rAAV diffusion and transduction levels.
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Acknowledgements
We are indebted to Estelle Toublanc and the Vector Core of the University Hospital of Nantes for providing the rAAVCMVnlsLacZ and the rAAVCMVhAAT vectors. We also thank Lydie Guigand for technical support for the morphological studies. This work was supported by grants from the Association Francaise contre les Myopathies (AFM) and the Association Nantaise de Thérapie Génique (ANTG).
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Favre, D., Cherel, Y., Provost, N. et al. Hyaluronidase enhances recombinant adeno-associated virus (rAAV)-mediated gene transfer in the rat skeletal muscle. Gene Ther 7, 1417–1420 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.gt.3301256
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.gt.3301256
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