Haploinsufficiency of the intellectual disability-gene SETD5 disturbs developmental gene expression and cognition

SETD5 gene mutations have been identified as a frequent cause of idiopathic intellectual disability. Here we show that Setd5 haploinsufficient mice present developmental defects such as abnormal brain to body weight ratio and neural crest defect associated phenotypes. Furthermore, Setd5 mutant mice show impairments in cognitive tasks, enhanced long-term potentiation, delayed ontogenetic profile of ultrasonic vocalisation and behavioural inflexibility. Behavioural issues are accompanied by abnormal expression of postsynaptic density proteins previously associated with cognition. Our data suggest that Setd5 might regulate RNA polymerase II dynamics and gene transcription during development and learning via its interaction with the Hdac3 and Paf1 complexes. Our results emphasize the decisive role of Setd5 in a biological pathway found to be disrupted in intellectual disability and autism spectrum disorder patients. Overall design: RNA-sequencing for wild type and Setd5 heterozygous knockout mice in two settings. First, in whole embryo samples (age E9.5), three biological replicates each. Second, gene expression changes due to contextual fear conditioning (CFC) was studied by comparing baseline transcription in homecage (HC) mice with transcription one hour (CFC_1h) or three hours (CFC_3h) after fear conditioning (4-5 biological replicates per time point and genotype).

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Deliu E, Arecco N, Morandell J, Dotter CP, Contreras X, Girardot C, Käsper EL, Kozlova A, Kishi K, Chiaradia I, Noh KM, Novarino G