TR-FRET-Based Duplex Immunoassay Reveals an Inverse Correlation of Soluble and Aggregated Mutant huntingtin in Huntington's Disease

Summary Huntington's disease (HD) is an inherited neurodegenerative disorder caused by the amplification of a polyglutamine stretch at the N terminus of the huntingtin protein. N-terminal fragments of the mutant huntingtin (mHtt) aggregate and form intracellular inclusions in brain and peripheral tissues. Aggregates are an important hallmark of the disease, translating into a high need to quantify them in vitro and in vivo. We developed a one-step TR-FRET-based immunoassay to quantify soluble and aggregated mHtt in cell and tissue homogenates. Strikingly, quantification revealed a decrease of soluble mHtt correlating with an increase of aggregated protein in primary neuronal cell cultures, transgenic R6/2, and Hdh Q150 knock-in HD mice. These results emphasize the assay's efficiency for highly sensitive and quantitative detection of soluble and aggregated mHtt and its application in high-throughput screening and characterization of HD models.