Evaluation of ferritin-overexpressing brain in newly developed transgenic mice

Aberrant expression of ferritin, a major iron-binding protein, has shown to be involved in neurodegenerative diseases. In this study, wegenerated transgenic (Tg) mice of human ferritin heavy chain (FTH) gene and investigated the effects of ferritin overexpression in FTH-Tgbrain by 1H-MRI and 1H-MRS. The mice displayed no apparent neurological symptoms, and no specific morphological and T2 alterationswere found in the brain by MRI, and not even by histological studies. 1H-MRS, however, revealed that some metabolic markers weresignificantly altered in FTH-Tg brains compared to wild-type control brains, such as decreases in myo-inositol and glutamine, and an increasein lactate. Our present studies suggested that despite the absence of neurological, morphological, T2, and histological signatures, brainmetabolisms were significantly affected in FTH-Tg mice. This study also highlights the usefulness of 1H-MRS in the analysis of transgenicmouse models