Transcriptomics data of blood and brain from the YAC128 Huntington's disease mouse model [brain]

Therapeutic development for Huntington's disease (HD) would benefit from a method to monitor disease progression and treatment efficacy, ideally using blood biomarkers. Previously, HD-specific signatures were identified in human blood which adequately represented signatures in human brain, showing biomarker potential. Since drug candidates are normally first screened in rodent models, we aimed to identify HD-signatures in blood and brain of YAC128 HD mice and validate these with our previously identified human signatures. In both brain and blood, we identified HD-associated modules using Weighted Gene Co-expression Network Analysis (WGCNA) representing various biological processes previously associated with HD. Disease-related processes in blood and brain showed substantial overlap, including processes related to protein modification, cell cycle, RNA splicing, nuclear transport and vesicle-mediated transport. Moreover, the disease-associated processes shared between mouse blood and brain were highly comparable to those previously identified in human blood and brain. In addition to shared pathology, we identified HD-associated blood modules showing blood-specific pathology. Brain RNAseq data from four brain regions collected from YAC128 and control mice around 20 months of age.