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A novel preclinical model of mucopolysaccharidosis type II for developing human hematopoietic stem cell gene therapy

Gene Therapy volume 30, pages 288–296 (2023)Cite this article

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Abstract

A hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) gene therapy (GT) using lentiviral vectors has attracted interest as a promising treatment approach for neuropathic lysosomal storage diseases. To proceed with the clinical development of HSC-GT, evaluation of the therapeutic potential of gene-transduced human CD34+ (hCD34+) cells in vivo is one of the key issues before human trials. Here, we established an immunodeficient murine model of mucopolysaccharidosis type II (MPS II), which are transplantable human cells, and demonstrated the application of those mice in evaluating the therapeutic efficacy of gene-modified hCD34+ cells. NOG/MPS II mice, which were generated using CRISPR/Cas9, exhibited a reduction of disease-causing enzyme iduronate-2-sulfatatase (IDS) activity and the accumulation of glycosaminoglycans in their tissues. When we transplanted hCD34+ cells transduced with a lentiviral vector carrying the IDS gene into NOG/MPS II mice, a significant amelioration of biochemical pathophenotypes was observed in the visceral and neuronal tissues of those mice. In addition, grafted cells in the NOG/MPS II mice showed the oligoclonal integration pattern of the vector, but no obvious clonal dominance was detected in the mice. Our findings indicate the promising application of NOG/MPS II mice to preclinical study of HSC-GT for MPS II using human cells.

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Fig. 1: Biochemical characterization of NOG/MPS II mice.
Fig. 2: Scheme of pLGT1-MND-IDS lentiviral vector and experimental design.
Fig. 3: Engraftment of human cells in NOG/MPS II mice after GT and HSCT.
Fig. 4: IDS activity in NOG/MPS II mice after GT and HSCT.
Fig. 5: GAG accumulation in NOG/MPS II mice after GT and HSCT.
Fig. 6: Vector integration site analysis of the bone marrow and spleen from NOG/MPS II mice after GT.

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Data availability

The data analyzed during this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge Mr. Tim Rath (GeneWerk) for analysis of the integration sites. Additionally, we thank Ms. Sayoko Iizuka, (The Jikei University School of Medicine) for her excellent technical assistance. This study was supported by AMED under grant no. JP19ek109224h, and Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C) (19K08262).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Gene Therapy, Research Center for Medical Sciences, The Jikei University School of Medicine, Tokyo, 105-8461, Japan

    Yohta Shimada, Natsumi Ishii, Takashi Higuchi & Hiroshi Kobayashi

  2. Animal Resource Technology Center, Central Institute for Experimental Animals (CIEA), Kawasaki, 210-0821, Japan

    Motohito Goto

  3. Department of Human Health Science and Therapeutics, The Jikei University School of Nursing, Tokyo, 182-8570, Japan

    Toya Ohashi

  4. Department of Pediatrics, The Jikei University School of Medicine, Tokyo, 105-8461, Japan

    Hiroshi Kobayashi

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  1. Yohta Shimada
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Contributions

Y.S. and T.O. conceptualized the project; Y.S., T.O., and H.K. designed experiments; Y.S., N.I., T.H., and M.G. performed experiments and analyzed the data; Y.S., N.I., T.H., M.G., T.O., and H.K. discussed the data. Y.S. wrote the original manuscript; T.H., M.G., T.O., and H.K. reviewed and edited the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Yohta Shimada.

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Shimada, Y., Ishii, N., Higuchi, T. et al. A novel preclinical model of mucopolysaccharidosis type II for developing human hematopoietic stem cell gene therapy. Gene Ther 30, 288–296 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41434-022-00357-y

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