Immuno-electron microscopic evidence for two different types of partial somatic repair of the mutant brattleboro vasopressin gene

Abstract In homozygous Brattleboro rats a frame-shift mutation in the vasopressin gene prevents secretion of vasopressin by magnocellular neurosecretory neurons and thus causes diabetes insipidus. Whereas most “vasopressin” neurons in Brattleboro homozygotes apparently lack vasopressin and its associated neurophysin and glycopeptide, some isolated cells overcome the mutation and “revert” to producing readily detectable amounts of vasopressin. We describe here two morphologically and immunocytochemically distinct subsets of such “revertant” cells. One subset contain, in their rough endoplasmic reticulum cisterns, electron-dense aggregates immunoreactive for vasopressin, for parts of oxytocin-neurophysin, and for CP14 (a peptide with a sequence deduced from the mutated precursor), but not for vasopressin-associated glycopeptide (“glycopeptide”) or vasopressin-neurophysin. In Brattleboro heterozygotes, which have one mutant and one normal copy of the vasopressin gene, morphologically similar revertant cells exist; the aggregates in the rough endoplasmic reticulum of these cells do not immunolabel for CP14, but the cells do produce 160-nm neurosecretory granules immunoreactive for vasopressin, vasopressin-neurophysin and glycopeptide. In Brattleboro homozygotes, the second, more abundant subset of neurons which recover vasopressin immunoreactivity also express vasopressin-associated glycopeptide and CP14 but not oxytocin-neurophysin; both glycopeptide and CP14 are restricted to the rough endoplasmic reticulum but do not form aggregates. We conclude that two different somatic repairs of the Brattleboro mutation can occur. We propose that, in aggregate-containing neurons, exons B and C have been exchanged between the vasopressin and oxytocin genes; glycopeptide-immunoreactive neurons have either undergone mismatch repair or exchanged exon B.