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Pleiotropic Effects of Taurine on Nematode Model for Down Syndrome

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Taurine 11

Part of the book series: Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology ((AEMB,volume 1155))

Abstract

Taurine is traditionally used to treat Down Syndrome (DS); however, the actual foundation for this treatment is not well understood. DS patients suffer from disturbance of the proteostasis network (PN) due to aberrant calcium signaling, which eventually causes endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS). Taurine has been suggested to play a role in modulating calcium homeostasis and ERS. This study examined whether taurine affects DS symptoms using C. elegans – a DS model in which calcineurins, Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein phosphatase is mutated to null. The DS nematode model has short body length, slow growth, fertility defects, serotonin-resistant egg-laying defects, and faulty thermal sensing. This study focused on whether taurine may ameliorate the severity of DS at the whole-body level, including reduction in ERS. When treated with taurine, DS nematodes appeared to have lower levels of ERS and phenotypes closer to the wild type. DS nematodes also showed improved egg laying efficiency and thermal sensing index comparable to the wild type. Our findings offer a new perspective on the effectiveness of taurine in treating DS and designing therapeutic strategies to lower ERS and restore disrupted PN.

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Abbreviations

DS:

Down syndrome

DSCR-1:

Down syndrome critical region 1

RCN:

Regulator of calcineurin

Can a(b):

Calcineurin A(B)

NGM:

Nematode growth medium

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Acknowledgement

This research was supported by the Korea Nazarene University Reseach Grants 2019. 

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Child Studies, Korea Nazarene University, Chonan City, South Korea

    Hyunsook Chang

  2. Department of Life Sciences, University of Seoul, Seoul, South Korea

    Dong Hee Lee

Authors
  1. Hyunsook Chang
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  2. Dong Hee Lee
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Dong Hee Lee .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. College of Animal Science and Veterinary Medicine, Shenyang Agricultural University, Shenyang, Liaoning, China

    Jianmin Hu

  2. Department of Occupational and Environmental Health, Dalian Medicine University, Dalian, Liaoning, China

    Fengyuan Piao

  3. Department of Pharmacology, College of Medicine, University of South Alabama, Mobile, AL, USA

    Stephen W. Schaffer

  4. Department of Biology, Center for Developmental Neuroscience, College of Staten Island, Staten Island, NY, USA

    Abdeslem El Idrissi

  5. Department of Biomedical Science, Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine, Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, FL, USA

    Jang-Yen Wu

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© 2019 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

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Chang, H., Lee, D.H. (2019). Pleiotropic Effects of Taurine on Nematode Model for Down Syndrome. In: Hu, J., Piao, F., Schaffer, S., El Idrissi, A., Wu, JY. (eds) Taurine 11. Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology, vol 1155. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-8023-5_40

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