Mutations in atlastin-1 (ATL-1), a gene known to cause pure, early-onset autosomal dominant hereditary spastic paraplegia SPG3A, have been recently reported to cause hereditary sensory neuropathy I (HSN I).
We advocate that all spastin mutation negative AD-HSP kindreds should be screened for pathogenic atlastin mutations regardless of age of onset or phenotypic complexity.
Mutations in the SPG3A gene, which encodes the large guanosine triphosphatase atlastin, are the second most common cause of autosomal dominant hereditary spastic paraplegia.
Partial SPAST deletions, but not SPAST amplifications and SPG3A copy number aberrations, represent an underestimated cause of autosomal dominant hereditary spastic paraplegia.
In this study, we compared spinal cord magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in 13 HSP patients with four different types of autosomal dominant hereditary spastic paraplegia (SPG3A, SPG4, SPG6, and SPG8) with age-matched control subjects.
We report a novel mutation in the SPG3A gene in an African American family with an infantile onset of autosomal dominant hereditary spastic paraplegia.
Autosomal dominant hereditary spastic paraplegia linked to the SPG3A locus on chromosome 14q11-21 accounts for approximately 10% of autosomal dominant hereditary spastic paraplegia (ADHSP).
We performed mutation screening by direct sequencing of all 14 exons and flanking sequences of the SPG3A gene in affected individuals from 12 unrelated English families, all with an early onset uncomplicated ADHSP in whom spastin mutations had previously been excluded.
Laboratory analysis showed that the disorder was not caused by mutations in genes that cause SCA-1, SCA-2, SCA-3, SCA-6, SCA-7, SCA-8, and SCA-12; not linked to other known loci for autosomal dominant ataxia (SCA-4, SCA-5, SCA-10, SCA-11, SCA-13, SCA-14, and SCA-16); and not linked to known loci for autosomal dominant hereditary spastic paraplegia (HSP) (SPG-3, SPG-4, SPG-6, SPG-8, SPG-9, SPG-10, SPG-12, and SPG-13) or autosomal recessive HSP SPG-7.