Huntingtin is an RNA binding protein and participates in <i>NEAT1</i> -mediated paraspeckles
Manisha Yadav, Rachel Harding, Tiantian Li, Xin Xu, Terence Gall-Duncan, Mahreen Khan, Costanza Ferrari Bardile, Glen Lester Sequiera, Shili Duan, Renu Chandrasekaran, Anni Pan, Jiachuan Bu, Tomohiro Yamazaki, Tetsuro Hirose, Panagiotis Prinos, Lynette J. Tippett, Clinton Turner, Maurice A. Curtis, Richard L. M. Faull, Mahmoud A. Pouladi, Christopher E. Pearson, Housheng Hansen He, C.H. Arrowsmith
Abstract
Huntingtin protein, mutated in Huntington’s disease, is implicated in nucleic acid–mediated processes, yet the evidence for direct huntingtin–nucleic acid interaction is limited. Here, we show wild-type and mutant huntingtin copurify with nucleic acids, primarily RNA, and interact directly with G-rich RNAs in in vitro assays. Huntingtin RNA-immunoprecipitation sequencing from patient-derived fibroblasts and neuronal progenitor cells expressing wild-type and mutant huntingtin revealed long noncoding RNA NEAT1 as a significantly enriched transcript. Altered NEAT1 levels were evident in Huntington’s disease cells and postmortem brain tissues, and huntingtin knockdown decreased NEAT1 levels. Huntingtin colocalized with NEAT1 in paraspeckles, and we identified a high-affinity RNA motif preferred by huntingtin. This study highlights NEAT1 as a huntingtin interactor, demonstrating huntingtin’s involvement in RNA-mediated functions and paraspeckle regulation.