Expression levels of protein inhibitor of activated STAT (PIAS) family genes in Parkinson's disease patients: results from a case-control study.

Background: Parkinson's disease (PD) is one of the most common progressive neurological disorders characterized by the loss of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra of the midbrain. In recent years, PIAS family proteins have been proposed as key factors in the development of neurodegenerative diseases. The aim of this study was to investigate the expression levels of PIAS family genes in patients with PD and compare them with those in the healthy control group.

Methods: The expression of PIAS family genes in the peripheral blood cells was investigated by RT-qPCR technique and the results were statistically analyzed using R software.

Results: PIAS4 gene expression was significantly lower in PD patients compared to the control group (p = 0.016), while we found no significant change in the expression of other PIAS genes between PD patients and healthy control group. Considering gender, the expression of PIAS3 was higher in males than that in females (p = 0.024). Also, significant downregulations in PIAS3 and PIAS4 genes were observed with increasing age, especially in men regardless of being patient or healthy (p = 0.04 and 0.001, respectively). In the correlation analysis, there were significant positive pairwise correlations between PIAS family members. Also, significant negative correlations between the expression of PIAS3 and PIAS4 genes with age were found.

Conclusion: These findings show that part of the disruption of immune system regulation occurring in PD is probably related to the expression of PIAS family genes and that these proteins, especially PIAS4, can play an important role in the inflammatory and pathophysiological mechanisms of PD.