Nrf2 and Parkinson’s disease

This 2020 rodent study investigated a long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) in Parkinson’s disease:

“Knockdown of MALAT1 (metastasis-associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1) lncRNA inhibited elevated nuclear factor (erythroid-derived 2)-like-2 factor (NRF2) expression, thereby inhibiting inflammasome activation and ROS (reactive oxygen species) production. MALAT1 was shown to promote neuroinflammation by recruiting enhancer of zeste homologue 2 (EZH2) to the promoter of NRF2, suppressing Nrf2 expression.

EZH2 catalyses generation of trimethylated H3K27 (H3K27me3) from histone H3 at lysine 27 (H3K27). EZH2 plays an important role in regulating the essential genes for inflammation in microglial activation, which induces neurodegeneration in the central nervous system.

Our results also validated MALAT1 binding to EZH2 in LPS-treated BV2 cells, which further recruited H3K27me3 to the gene promoter loci of Nrf2 to repress Nrf2 transcription. Although silencing MALAT1 did not alter global EZH2 expression levels, decreased binding between EZH2 and the Nrf2 promoter was observed. Previous studies have revealed that lncRNAs regulate the function of EZH2 in a similar manner.

MALAT1 epigenetically inhibits NRF2, thereby inducing inflammasome activation and ROS production in PD mouse and microglial cell models. To the best of our knowledge, it is first report of the important role of EZH2 in regulating the expression of Nrf2 to activate microglial inflammation.”

https://molecularbrain.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13041-020-00656-8 “LncRNA MALAT1 facilitates inflammasome activation via epigenetic suppression of Nrf2 in Parkinson’s disease”

Eat broccoli sprouts today! referenced a letter to the editor that cited The Ezh2 Polycomb Group Protein Drives an Aggressive Phenotype in Melanoma Cancer Stem Cells and is a Target of Diet Derived Sulforaphane which found: