Network Spotlight

Collaborative Research Network (CRN) Teams Kordower, Liddle, and Rio each created open-access protocols that were among the top 100 most viewed protocols on protocols.io during the month of August. These protocols include Mouse Perfusions (Team Kordower), Y-Maze Protocol (Team Liddle), and Culture and Transfection of HEK293T Cells (Team Rio).

Members of the Assessment of Motor and Non-Motor PD Symptoms Working Group, Roberta Marongiu, PhD (CRN Team Kaplitt), Thomas Wichmann, MD (CRN Team Wichmann), Alexandra Nelson, MD, PhD (CRN Team Edwards), Per Svennigsson, MD, PhD (CRN Team Kaplitt), Eileen Ruth Torres, PhD (CRN Team Kaplitt), and Jacquelyn Haytayan, BSc (CRN Team Kaplitt), developed guidelines and considerations for the most commonly used rodent behavioral assays of Parkinson’s disease. They also added a collection of suggested protocols for these assays to the ASAP workspace on protocols.io. ASAP applauds the working group’s contribution to reproducibility and standardization of rodent behavior assays in Parkinson’s. 

Members of the Clinical and Immune Working Group, Xiqun Chen, MD, PhD (CRN Team Chen), Anthony Schapira, PhD (CRN Team Schapira), Weiyi Peng, PhD (CRN Team Chen), and Sara Lucas Del Pozo, MD (CRN Team Schapira), developed standardized templates for reporting on metadata associated with participants of a clinical trial and studies that utilize PBMCs. Metadata is important for ensuring data is understandable and reusable to anyone now or in the future. ASAP applauds the working group’s contribution to the standardization and reuse of clinical datasets.

Bishal Basak, PhD (CRN Team Hurley) single-handedly worked on the Team Hurley paper, “Mitochondrial damage triggers concerted degradation of negative regulators of neuronal autophagy.” Dysfunction of mitochondrial quality control pathways, such as mitophagy, has long been implicated in Parkinson’s disease. However, therapeutics aimed at targeting mitophagy have been largely unsuccessful. Bishal’s work identifies a novel, neuron-specific mitophagy pathway that could serve as a new therapeutic target to enhance mitochondrial quality control. ASAP applauds Bishal’s contribution to the Parkinson’s disease field.