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To better understand the particular vulnerability of mesencephalic dopaminergic neurons to toxins or gene mutations causing parkinsonism, we have taken advantage of a primary cell culture system in which these neurons die selectively. Antimitotic agents, such as cytosine arabinoside or cAMP, prevent the death of the neurons by arresting astrocyte proliferation. To identify factors implicated in either the death of the dopaminergic neurons or in the neuroprotective effect of cAMP, we constructed cDNA libraries enriched by subtractive hybridization and suppressive PCR in transcripts that are preferentially expressed in either control or cAMP-treated cultures. Differentially expressed transcripts were identified by hybridization of the enriched cDNAs with a commercially available cDNA expression array. The proteoglycan receptors syndecan-3 and the receptor protein tyrosine phosphatase zeta/beta were found among the transcripts preferentially expressed under control conditions, and their ligand, the cytokine pleiotrophin, was highly represented in the cDNA libraries for both conditions. Since pleiotrophin is expressed during embryonic and perinatal neural development and following lesions in the adult brain, we investigated its role in our cell culture model. Pleiotrophin was not responsible for the death of dopaminergic neurons under control conditions, or for their survival in cAMP-treated cultures. It was, however, implicated in the initial and cAMP-dependent enhancement of the differentiation of the dopaminergic neurons in our cultures. In addition, our experiments have provided evidence for a cAMP-dependent regulatory pathway leading to protease activation, and the identification of pleiotrophin as a target of this pathway.

Cyclic AMP-elevating agents are highly effective in preventing the loss of dopaminergic neurons that occurs spontaneously in neuronal-glial mesencephalic cultures. We demonstrate here that cAMP causes a concomitant decline in the number of dividing non-neuronal cells, suggesting that inhibition of proliferation contributes to neuroprotection. Consistent with this hypothesis, a transient treatment with the antimitotic cytosine arabinoside, at concentrations that induce long-term repression of glial cell proliferation, mimicked the neuroprotective action of cAMP and also obviated the need for the cyclic nucleotide. Treatment with cAMP-elevating agents reduced the population of OX-42-positive microglial cells and the number of immature astrocytes expressing vimentin and low levels of the astrocytic marker glial fibrillary acidic protein. The effect on the immature astrocytes, however, seemed essential for neuroprotection. Ciliary neurotrophic factor and leukemia inhibitory factor, which stimulate astrocyte differentiation without reducing cell proliferation, failed to reproduce the protective effects of the cyclic nucleotide. Cyclic AMP did not operate by counteracting the action of the astrocyte mitogen epidermal growth factor or by reducing activation of the mitogen-activated protein kinase signaling pathway. The neuroprotective and antiproliferative actions of cAMP, however, were closely mimicked by olomoucine and roscovitine, potent inhibitors of the cyclin-dependent kinase CDK1 that are structurally related to cAMP. Measurement of CDK1 activity confirmed that neuroprotection was closely correlated with inhibition of this kinase by cAMP. In summary, neuroprotection of mesencephalic dopaminergic neurons by cAMP most probably requires the repression of presumptive astrocytes through inhibition of CDK1.

We have shown previously that low concentrations of noradrenaline (NA) confer long-term but partial protection to tyrosine hydroxylase (TH(+)) dopaminergic neurons by reducing spontaneously occurring oxidative stress. We demonstrate here that the effect of NA is strongly enhanced by cAMP-elevating agents, in particular forskolin (FK), through a mechanism that does not involve activation of adrenoceptors. FK also enhanced the neuroprotective action of antioxidants that mimic the trophic effects of NA, such as trolox and pyrocatechol, but was totally ineffective by itself, suggesting that inhibition of oxidative stress was a required step to reveal the cAMP-dependent mechanism. Neuroprotection afforded by FK was rapidly reversible, optimal when the treatment was initiated in the early phase of the culture and exquisitely specific to dopaminergic neurons. FK stimulated the phosphorylation of extracellular signal-activated kinases (ERK)(1/2) in a subpopulation of dopaminergic neurons, suggesting that the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway was involved in the effects of cAMP-elevating agents. Accordingly, inhibition of the upstream kinases of ERK(1/2) by 2'-amino-3'-methoxyflavone (PD98059) not only suppressed MAPK activation caused by FK but also abolished the survival promoting activity that this compound exerts on TH(+) neurons. PD98059 did not reduce, however, the trophic effects provided by NA alone. Surprisingly, the archetypal cAMP-dependent protein kinase was apparently not responsible for ERK(1/2) activation. The data suggest that the MAPK signaling pathway plays a key role in the trophic effects that cAMP elevating agents and NA cooperatively exert on TH(+) neurons.