Brain region-specific decrease in the activity and expression of protein kinase A in the frontal cortex of regressive autism

Autism is a severe neurodevelopmental disorder that is characterized by impaired language, communication, and social skills. In regressive autism, affected children first show signs of normal social and language development but eventually lose these skills and develop autistic behavior. Protein kina...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2011-08, Vol.6 (8), p.e23751-e23751
Main Authors: Ji, Lina, Chauhan, Ved, Flory, Michael J, Chauhan, Abha
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Abnormalities
Adolescent
Adult
Age
AMP-Activated Protein Kinases - metabolism
Autism
Autistic Disorder - diagnosis
Autistic Disorder - enzymology
Behavior
Biology
Brain
Brain research
Case-Control Studies
Catalysis
Catalytic Domain
Cell differentiation
Cellular signal transduction
Cerebellum
Child
Child, Preschool
Children
Communication
Cortex (frontal)
Cortex (occipital)
Cortex (parietal)
Cortex (temporal)
Cyclic adenosine monophosphate
Cyclic AMP
Developmental disabilities
Differentiation (biology)
Female
Frontal Lobe - enzymology
Frontal Lobe - pathology
Gene expression
Genes
Human communication
Humans
Kinases
Language
Language acquisition
Male
Medicine
Neurodevelopmental disorders
Neurons
Neurophysiology
Occipital lobe
Organ Specificity
Phosphorylation
Population
Protein kinase A
Protein kinases
Proteins
Regulation
Rodents
Signal transduction
Signaling
Skills
Studies
Temporal cortex
Tissue Donors
Transcription factors
Young Adult
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Autism is a severe neurodevelopmental disorder that is characterized by impaired language, communication, and social skills. In regressive autism, affected children first show signs of normal social and language development but eventually lose these skills and develop autistic behavior. Protein kinases are essential in G-protein-coupled, receptor-mediated signal transduction and are involved in neuronal functions, gene expression, memory, and cell differentiation. We studied the activity and expression of protein kinase A (PKA), a cyclic AMP-dependent protein kinase, in postmortem brain tissue samples from the frontal, temporal, parietal, and occipital cortices, and the cerebellum of individuals with regressive autism; autistic subjects without a clinical history of regression; and age-matched developmentally normal control subjects. The activity of PKA and the expression of PKA (C-α), a catalytic subunit of PKA, were significantly decreased in the frontal cortex of individuals with regressive autism compared to control subjects and individuals with non-regressive autism. Such changes were not observed in the cerebellum, or the cortices from the temporal, parietal, and occipital regions of the brain in subjects with regressive autism. In addition, there was no significant difference in PKA activity or expression of PKA (C-α) between non-regressive autism and control groups. These results suggest that regression in autism may be associated, in part, with decreased PKA-mediated phosphorylation of proteins and abnormalities in cellular signaling.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0023751