SXL and CJC research proposal for F08 20.109 click here for more information

The Diseases Prions(often denoted as PRP^C) can undergo a conformation change (often denoted as PRP^SC). This Prion conformational change is believed to cause many transmissible spongiform encephalopathies or TSEs which the CDC defines on their website define as " a family of rare progressive neuodegenerative disorders that affect both humans and animals". While these diseases are rare they are extremely infective. It is believed that this prion can be passed to other other organisms through excretion, blood transfusions, and consuming protein with this isoform. In fact, many of these diseases can infect different species. These diseases often have a long periods of time in which they incubate in the body and do not show any symptoms. Sometimes this incubation can be as short as a few months and sometimes it can be as long as decades.

The Problem People infected with the prion often have do not know if they have it until it progresses late symptoms of neuodegenrative properties appear. One of the few ways to test for presence of this conformational during the incubated time of this folded protein is through invasive procedures that require a biopsy of brain or of neuron cells. While these prions exist in blood, urine, or fluids of the eye, they have such a low concentration it is almost impossible to detect presence of misfolded prions. Recently, there is a procedure known as PMCA found by Gonzalez-Romero et. al that allows the concentration of prions with the wrong conformation change to be amplified from urine. This procedure has open the doorway to exploring noninvasive tests to determine if someone has contracted this prion change.

Our Goal We would like to design and test an assay that uses this PMCA method and improves the efficiency. If the assay shows promising results, we will test it further and hopefully down the road we can introduce this assay or test as a common, easy and convient test that could be conducted by a hospital to verify that a person does or does not have this form of prion folding. While we are using the PMCA method invented by Gonzalez-Romero et al, our assay will be novel and different than them. Our initial plan is to use plasminogen binding property of PRP^SC conformational prions to help discriminate between different conformations of prion and improve upon this procedure to give more reliable results.

Papers and Resources

Plasminogen binds to disease-associated prion protein of multiple species

Dection of infectious prions in urine

Non-invasive, ultra-sensitive, high-throughput assays to quantify rare biomarkers in the blood

A Pitfall in Diagnosis of Human Prion Diseases Using Detection of Protease-resistant Prion Protein in Urine

Immunoglobulins in Urine of Hamsters with Scrapie

The risk of transmission of variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease via contact lenses and ophthalmic devices

Prions and the proteasome

UV-Light Exposed Prion Protein Fails to Form Amyloid Fibrils

Regulation of Prion Gene Expression by Transcription Factors SP1 and MTF-1