Catalog

ASAP is committed to accelerating the pace of discovery and informing a path to a cure for Parkinson’s disease through collaboration, research-enabling resources, and data sharing. We’ve created this catalog to showcase the research outputs and tools developed by ASAP-funded programs.

Article

3D bioprinting of human neural tissues with functional connectivity

Probing how human neural networks operate is hindered by the lack of reliable human neural tissues amenable to the dynamic functional assessment of neural circuits. Team Scherzer developed a 3D bioprinting platform to assemble tissues with defined human neural cell types in a desired dimension using a commercial bioprinter.

Article

The Parkinson’s disease protein alpha-synuclein is a modulator of processing bodies and mRNA stability

Genetic modulation of P-body components alters αS toxicity, and human genetic analysis lends support to the disease-relevance of these interactions. Beyond revealing an unexpected aspect of αS function and pathology, the authors’ data highlight the versatility of conformationally plastic proteins with high intrinsic disorder.

Protocol

Transferrin uptake assay to measure Clathrin-mediated endocytosis in HIPCS derived neurons

This protocol is used to measure Transferrin uptake as a way to investigate Clathrin-mediated endocytosis in HIPCS derived neurons, or other cell types.

Article

Chemically induced senescence in human stem cell‐derived neurons promotes phenotypic presentation of neurodegeneration

Published: Using embryonic stem-cell derived neurons to model age-related neurodegenerative diseases is inherently difficult. The authors thereby developed a chemical cocktail to induce cellular senescence (without causing DNA damage), thereby inducing embryonic cells to exhibit features characteristic of aged cells. The cocktail can help enhance disease-related phenotypes in iPSCs.

Article

Towards a phenome-wide view of Parkinson’s disease

Preprint: The authors examine that relationship between PD and the environment by holistically characterizing environmental, health, and pharmacological traits associated with PD patients. They found numerous traits that were positively and negatively associated with PD.

Article

Nicotine-mediated rescue of α-synuclein toxicity requires synaptic vesicle glycoprotein 2

Published: Parkinson’s disease likely reflects a complex interaction among genetic and environmental factors. Here, the role of nicotine, SV2 and the alpha-synuclein were examined. The study suggests that SV2 may be needed for the protection nicotine provides from Parkinson’s-related neurotoxicity. View original preprint.

Article

Targeting cellular senescence with senotherapeutics: senolytics and senomorphics

Review: This article reviews the current state of the development of senolytics and senomorphics for the treatment of age-related diseases and disorders and extension of healthy longevity. In addition, the challenges of documenting senolytic and senomorphic activity in pre-clinical models and the current state of the clinical application of the different senotherapeutics are discussed.

Article

Detecting Full-Length EccDNA with FLED and long-reads sequencing

The authors’ method takes advantage of nanopore long reads and enables unbiased reconstruction of full-length eccDNA sequences. FLED is implemented using Python3 which is freely available on GitHub (https://github.com/FuyuLi/FLED).

Protocol

Confirming circRNA expression by qPCR

This protocol delineates a qPCR method to confirm the expression of circRNAs extracted from brain samples.

Protocol

Sample collection and processing for RNA analysis

This protocol delineates the steps taken to collect frozen postmortem human brain samples and process them for RNA extraction and analysis.

Article

powerEQTL: an R package and shiny application for sample size and power calculation of bulk tissue and single-cell eQTL analysis

Published: Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) reveal thousands of genetic loci. To understand the causality of the genetic variants, many researchers employ expression of quantitative trait locus (eQTL) analysis. The authors created a simplified, user-friendly R package called powerEQTL to aid in performing the power calculations needed for eQTL analysis. View original preprint.

Article

α-synuclein promotes neuronal dysfunction and death by disrupting the binding of ankyrin to ß-spectrin

Published: The authors’ findings define a specific molecular mechanism by which elevated levels of α-synuclein in Parkinson’s disease and related α-synucleinopathies leads to neuronal dysfunction and death. View original preprint.

Dataset

Generation of locus coeruleus norepinephrine neurons from human pluripotent stem cells

A dataset related to the development of human LC-NE neurons from human pluripotent stem cells.