Neurodevelopmental Disorders Associated with PSD-95 and Its Interaction Partners

Abstract

The postsynaptic density (PSD) is a massive protein complex, critical for synaptic strength and plasticity in excitatory neurons. Here, the scaffolding protein PSD-95 plays a crucial role as it organizes key PSD components essential for synaptic signaling, development, and survival. Recently, variants in DLG4 encoding PSD-95 were found to cause a neurodevelopmental disorder with a variety of clinical features including intellectual disability, developmental delay, and epilepsy. Genetic variants in several of the interaction partners of PSD-95 are associated with similar phenotypes, suggesting that deficient PSD-95 may affect the interaction partners, explaining the overlapping symptoms. Here, we review the transmembrane interaction partners of PSD-95 and their association with neurodevelopmental disorders. We assess how the structural changes induced by DLG4 missense variants may disrupt or alter such protein–protein interactions, and we argue that the pathological effect of DLG4 variants is, at least partly, exerted indirectly through interaction partners of PSD-95. This review presents a direction for functional studies to elucidate the pathogenic mechanism of deficient PSD-95, providing clues for therapeutic strategies.

Keywords

• postsynaptic density
• DLG4
• epilepsy
• synaptopathy
• clinical genetics
• excitatory synapses