TY - JOUR T1 - A mutation in <em>Hnrnph1</em> that decreases methamphetamine-induced reinforcement, reward, and dopamine release and increases synaptosomal hnRNP H and mitochondrial proteins JF - bioRxiv DO - 10.1101/717728 SP - 717728 AU - Qiu T. Ruan AU - Neema Yazdani AU - Benjamin C. Blum AU - Jacob A. Beierle AU - Weiwei Lin AU - Michal A. Coelho AU - Elissa K. Fultz AU - Aidan F. Healy AU - John R. Shahin AU - Amarpreet K. Kandola AU - Kimberly P. Luttik AU - Karen Zheng AU - Nathaniel J. Smith AU - Justin Cheung AU - Farzad Mortazavi AU - Daniel J. Apicco AU - Durairaj Ragu Varman AU - Sammanda Ramamoorthy AU - Peter E. A. Ash AU - Douglas L. Rosene AU - Andrew Emili AU - Benjamin Wolozin AU - Karen K. Szumlinski AU - Camron D. Bryant Y1 - 2019/01/01 UR - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/07/28/717728.abstract N2 - Individual variation in the addiction liability of amphetamines has a heritable genetic component. We previously identified Hnrnph1 (heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein H1) as a quantitative trait gene underlying decreased methamphetamine-induced locomotor activity in mice. Here, mice with a heterozygous mutation in the first coding exon of Hnrnph1 (H1+/-) showed reduced methamphetamine reinforcement and intake and dose-dependent changes in methamphetamine reward as measured via conditioned place preference. Furthermore, H1+/- mice showed a robust decrease in methamphetamine-induced dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens with no change in baseline extracellular dopamine, striatal whole tissue dopamine, dopamine transporter protein, or dopamine uptake. Immunohistochemical and immunoblot staining of midbrain dopaminergic neurons and their forebrain projections for tyrosine hydroxylase did not reveal any major changes in staining intensity, cell number, or in the number of forebrain puncta. Surprisingly, there was a two-fold increase in hnRNP H protein in the striatal synaptosome of H1+/- mice with no change in whole tissue levels. To gain insight into the molecular mechanisms linking increased synaptic hnRNP H with decreased methamphetamine-induced dopamine release and behaviors, synaptosomal proteomic analysis identified an increased baseline abundance of several mitochondrial complex I and V proteins that rapidly decreased at 30 min post-methamphetamine administration in H1+/- mice. In contrast, the much lower level of basal synaptosomal mitochondrial proteins in wild-type mice showed a rapid increase in response to methamphetamine. We conclude that H1+/- decreases methamphetamine–induced dopamine release, reward, and reinforcement and induces dynamic changes in basal and methamphetamine-induced synaptic mitochondrial function.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Methamphetamine dependence is a significant public health concern with no FDA-approved treatment. We discovered a role for the RNA binding protein hnRNP H in methamphetamine reward and reinforcement. Hnrnph1 mutation also blunted methamphetamine-induced dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens – a key neurochemical event contributing to methamphetamine addiction liability. Finally, Hnrnph1 mutants showed a marked increase in basal level of synaptosomal hnRNP H and mitochondrial proteins that decreased in response to methamphetamine whereas wild-type mice showed a methamphetamine-induced increase in synaptosomal mitochondrial proteins. Thus, we identified a potential role for hnRNP H in basal and dynamic mitochondrial function that informs methamphetamine-induced cellular adaptations associated with reduced addiction liability. ER -