Skip to main content

Huntington’s Disease

  • Chapter
Advances in Human Genetics

Part of the book series: Advances in Human Genetics ((AHUG,volume 20))

Abstract

Huntington’s disease (HD) is an autosomal dominant disorder characterized by onset in adult life of progressive involuntary choreiform movements, and dementia (1). Though others had previously recognized the disorder, it only received widespread attention after a comprehensive description was published by George Huntington in 1872 (2). Huntington, a physician on Long Island, not only provided an excellent clinical summary of the movement disorder, but, because his patients in East Hampton were the progeny of similarly affected individuals previously treated by his father and grandfather, he also noted the inherited nature of the disease. For some of these families, the disease has been traced to ancestors who immigrated from Bures, England, landing in New England in 1649 (3,4).

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

eBook
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  • Martin, J. B., and Gusella, J. F., 1986, Huntington’s disease: Pathogenesis and management, N. Engl. J. Med. 315: 1267–1276.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Huntington, G., 1872, On chorea, Med. Surg. Reporter 26: 317–321.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vessie, P. R., 1932, On the transmission of Huntington’s chorea for 300 years: The Bures family group, J. Nerv. Ment. Dis. 76: 553–573.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Muncey, E. B., 1964, Classical Huntington’s disease families, in: Huntington Chorea in the United States, ( S. C. Reed, ed.), Dight Institute for Human Genetics, Minneapolis.

    Google Scholar 

  • Folstein, S. E., 1989, Huntington’s Disease, Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland.

    Google Scholar 

  • Myers, R. H., and Martin, J. B., 1982, Huntington’s disease, Sem. Neurol. 2: 365–372.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sudarsky, L., Myers, R. H., and Walshe, T. M., 1983, Huntington’s disease in monozygotic twins reared apart, J. Med. Genet. 20: 408–411.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Bittenbender, J. B., and Quadfasel, F. A., 1962, Rigid and dakinetic forms of Huntington’s chorea, Arch. Neurol. 7: 275–288.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Merritt, A. D., Conneally, P. M., Rahman, N. F., and Drew, A. L., 1969, Juvenile Huntington’s chorea, in: Progress in Neurogenetics ( A. Barbeau and T. R. Brunette, eds.), Excerpta Medica, Amsterdam, pp. 645–650.

    Google Scholar 

  • Myers, R., Madden, J. J., Teague, J. L., and Falek, A., 1982, Factors related to onset age of Huntington disease, Am. J. Med. Genet. 34: 481–488.

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Hall, J. G., and Te-Juatco, L., 1983, Association between age of onset and parental inheritance in Huntington chorea, Am. J. Med. Genet. 16: 289–290.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Myers, R., Goldman, D., Bird, E. D., Sax, D. S., Merril, C. R., Schoenfeld, M., and Wolf, P. A., 1983, Maternal transmission in Huntington’s disease, Lancet 1: 208–210.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Myers, R., Cupples, L. A., Schoenfeld, M., D’Agostino, R. B., Terrin, N. C., Goldmakher, N., and Wolf, P. A., 1985, Maternal factors in onset of Huntington disease, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 37: 511–523.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Farrer, L. A., and Conneally, P. M., 1985, A genetic model for age at onset in Huntington disease, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 37: 350–357.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Boehnke, M., Conneally, P. M., and Lange, K., 1983, Two models for a maternal factor in the inheritance of Huntington disease, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 35: 845–860.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Irwin, C. C., Wexler, N. S., Young, A. B., Ozelius, L. J., Penney, J. B., Shoulson, I., Snodgrass, S. R., Ramos-Arroyo, M. A., Sanchez-Ramos, J., Penchaszadeh, G., Bonilla, E., Conneally, P. M., and Gusella, J. F., 1989, The role of mitochondrial DNA in Huntington’s disease, J. Mol. Neurosci. 1: 129–136.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Reik, W., 1988, Genomic inprinting: A possible mechanism for the parental origin effect in Huntington’s chorea, J. Med. Genet. 25: 805–808.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Bruyn, G. W., Bots, G. Th. Am., and Dom, R., 1979, Huntington’s chorea: Current neuropathological status, Adv. Neurol. 23: 83–93.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vonsattel, J. P., Meyers, R. H., Stevens, T. J., Ferrante, R. J., Bird, E. D., and Richardson, E. P., Jr., 1985, Neuropathologic classification of Huntington’s disease, J. Neuropathol. Exp. Neurol. 44: 559–577.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • DiFiglia, M., Pasik, T., and Pasik, P., 1980, Ultrastructure of Golgi-impregnated and Golgi-toned spiny and aspiny neurons in the monkey neostriatum, J. Neurocytol. 9: 471–492.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Graybiel, A. M., and Ragsdale, C. W., 1983, Biochemical anatomy of the striatum, in: Chemical Neuroanatomy, ( P. C. Emson, ed.), Raven Press, New York, pp. 427–504.

    Google Scholar 

  • DiFiglia, M., Pasik, P., and Pasik, P., 1976, A Golgi study of neuronal types in the neostriatum of monkeys, Brain Res. 114: 245–256.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ferrante, R. J., Kowall, N. W., Beal, M. F., Richardson, E. P., Jr., Bird, E. D., and Martin, J. B., 1985, Selective sparing of a class of striatal neurons in Huntington’s disease, Science 230: 561–563.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Graveland, G. A., Williams, R. S., and DiFiglia, M., 1983, A Golgi study of the human neostriatum; neurons and afferent fibers, J. Comp. Neurol. 217: 317–333.

    Google Scholar 

  • Graveland, G. A., Williams, R. S., and DiFiglia, M., 1985, Evidence for degenerative and regenerative changes in neostriatal spiny neurons in Huntington’s disease, Science 227: 770–773.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • DiFiglia, M., 1990, Excitotoxic injury of the neostriatum: A model for Huntington’s disease, TINS 13: 286–289.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Hayden, M. R., 1981, Huntington’s Chorea, Springer-Verlag, New York.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Palo, J., Somer, H., Ikonen, E., Karila, L., and Peltonen, L., 1987, Low prevalence of Huntington’s disease in Finland, Lancet 2: 805–806.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Stevens, D., and Parsonage, M., 1969, Mutation in Huntington’s chorea, J. Neurol. Neurosurg. Psychiatry 32: 140–143.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Shaw, M., and Caro, A., 1982, The mutation rate to Huntington’s chorea, J. Med. Genet. 19: 161–167.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Quarrell, O. W. J., Tyler, A., Cole, G., and Harper, P. S., 1986, The problem of isolated cases of Huntington’s disease in South Wales. 1974–1984, Clin. Genet. 30: 331–337.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chiu, E., and Brackenridge, C. J., 1976, A probable case of mutation in Huntington’s disease, J. Med. Genet. 13: 75–77.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Baraister, M., Burn, J., and Fazzone, T. A., 1983, Huntington’s chorea arising as a fresh mutation, J. Med. Genet. 20: 459–475.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wolff, G., Deuschl, G., Wienker, T. F., Hummel, K., Bender, K., Lucking, C. H., Schumacher, M., Hammer, J., and Oepen, G., 1989, New mutation to Huntington’s disease, J. Med. Genet. 26: 18–27.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gusella, J. F., 1986, DNA polymorphism and human disease, Annu. Rev. Biochem. 55: 831–854.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gusella, J. F., 1990, Location cloning strategy for characterizing genetic defects in Huntington’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease, FASEB J. 3: 2036–2041.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wexler, N. S., Young, A. B., Tanzi, R. E., Travers, H., Starosta-Rubenstein, S., Penney, J. B., Snodgrass, S. R., Shoulson, I., Gomez, F., Ramos-Arroyo, M. A., Penchaszadeh,, Moreno, R., Gibbons, K., Faryniarz, A., Hobbs, W., Anderson, M. A., Bonilla, E., Conneally, P. M., and Gusella, J. F., 1987, Homozygotes for Huntington’s disease, Nature 326: 194–197.

    Google Scholar 

  • Negrette, A., 1963, Corea de Huntington (Estudio de una sola familia investigada, traves de varias generaciones), Talleres Graficos, Universidad Zulia, Maracaibo, Venezuela. Young, A. B., Shoulson, I., Penney, J. B., Starosta-Rubenstein, S., Gomez, F., Travers, Ramos-Arroyo, M. A., Snodgrass, S. R., Bonilla, E., Moreno, H., and Wexler, N. S., 1986, Huntington’s disease in Venezuela: Neurologic features and functional decline, Neurology 36: 244–249.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gusella, J. F., Wexler, N. S., Conneally, P. M., Naylor, S. L., Anderson, M. A., Tanzi, R. E., Watkins, P. C., Ottina, K., Wallace, M. R., Sakaguchi, A. Y., Young, A. B., Shoulson, I., Bonilla, E., and Martin, J. B., 1983, A polymorphic DNA marker genetically linked to Huntington’s disease, Nature 306: 234–238.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gusella, J. F., Tanzi, R. E., Anderson, M. A., Hobbs, W., Gibbons, K., Raschtchian, R., Gilliam, T. C., Wallace, M. R., Wexler, N. S., and Conneally, P. M., 1984, DNA markers for nervous system diseases, Science 225: 1320–1326.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Zabel, B. U., Naylor, S. L., Sakaguchi, A. Y., and Gusella, J. F., 1986, Mapping of the DNA locus D4S10 and the linked Huntington’s disease gene to 4pl6-pl5, Cytogenet. Cell. Genet. 42: 187–191.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Magenis, R. E., Gusella, J., Weliky, K., Olson, S., Haight, G., Toth-Fejel, S., and Sheehy, R., 1986, Huntington disease-linked restriction fragment length polymorphism localized within band pl6.1 of chromosome 4 by in situ hybridization, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 39: 383–392.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wang, H. S., Greenberg, C. R., Hewitt, J., Kalousek, D., and Hayden, M. R., 1986, Subregional assignment of the linked marker G8 (D4S10) for Huntington’s disease to chromosome 4pl6.1–16.3, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 39: 392–396.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Landegent, J. E., Jansen, I. N., De Wal, N., Fisser-Groen, Y. M., Bakker, E., Van Der Ploeg, M., and Pearson, P. L., 1986, Fine mapping of the Huntington disease linked D4S20 locus by non-radioactive in situ hybridization, Hum. Genet. 73: 354–357.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gusella, J. F., Tanzi, R. E., Bader, P. I., Phelan, M. C., Stevenson, R., Hayden, M. R., Hofman, K. J., Faryniarz, A. G., and Gibbons, K., 1985, Deletion of Huntington’s disease-linked G8 (D4S10) locus in Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome, Nature 318: 75–78.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • MacDonald, M. E., Anderson, M. A., Gilliam, T. C., Tranebjaerg, L., Carpenter, N. J., Magenis, E., Hayden, M. R., Healey, S. T., Bonner, T. I., and Gusella, J. F., 1987, A somatic cell hybrid panel for localizing DNA segments near the Huntington’s disease gene, Genomics 1: 29–34.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Smith, B., Skarecky, D., Bengtsson, U., Magenis, R. E., Carpenter, N., Wasmuth, J. J., 1988, Isolation of DNA markers in the direction of the Huntington disease gene from the G8 locus, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 42: 335–344.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Conneally, P. M., Haines, J. L., Tanzi, R. E., Wexler, N. S., Penchaszadeh, G. K., Harper, P. S., Folstein, S. E., Cassiman, J. J., Myers, R. H., Young, A. B., Hayden, M. R., Falek, A., Tolosa, E. S., Crespi, S., Di Maio, L., Holmgren, G., Anvret, M., Kanazawa, I., and Gusella, J. F., 1989, Huntington disease: No evidence for locus heterogeneity, Genomics 5: 304–308.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gilliam, T. C., Tanzi, R. E., Haines, J. L., Bonner, T. I., Faryniarz, A. G., Hobbs, W. J., MacDonald, M. E., Cheng, S. V., Folstein, S. E., Conneally, P. M., Wexler, N. S., and Gusella, J. F., 1987, Localization of the Huntington’s disease gene to a small segment of chromosome 4 flanked by D4S10 and the telomere, Cell 50: 565–571.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gilliam, T. C., Bucan, M., MacDonald, M. E., Zimmer, M., Haines, J. L., Cheng, S. V., Pohl, T. M., Whaley, W. L., Allitto, B. A., Faryniarz, A., Wasmuth, J. J., Frischauf, A.-M., Conneally, P. M., Lehrach, H., and Gusella, J. F., 1987, A DNA segment encoding two genes very tightly linked to Huntington’s disease, Science 238: 950–952.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gilliam, T. C., Healey, S. T., MacDonald, M. E., Wasmuth, J., Stewart, G. D., Roy, J. C., and Gusella, J. F., 1987, Isolation of polymorphic DNA from human chromosome 4, Nucleic Acids Res. 15: 1445–1458.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Whaley, W. L., Michiels, F., MacDonald, M. E., Romano, D., Zimmer, M., Smith, B., Leavitt, J., Bucan, M., Haines, J. L., Gilliam, T. C., Zehetner, G., Smith, C., Cantor, C. R., Frischauf, A. M., Wasmuth, J. J., Lehrach, H., and Gusella, J. F., 1988, Mapping of D4S98/S114/S113 confines the Huntington’s defect to a reduced physical region at the telomere of chromosome 4, Nucleic Acids Res. 16: 11769–11780.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wasmuth, J. J., Hewitt, J., Smith, B., Allard, D., Haines, J. L., Skarecky, D., Partlow,, and Hayden, M. R., 1988, A highly polymorphic locus very tightly linked to the Huntington’s disease, Nature 332: 734–736.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wasmuth, J. J., Carlock, L. R., Smith, B., and Immken, L., 1986, A cell hybrid and recombinant DNA library that facilitate identification of polymorphic loci in the vicinity of the Huntington disease gene, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 39: 397–403.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Pohl, T. M., Zimmer, M., MacDonald, M. E., Smith, B., Bucan, M., Poustka, A., Volinia, S., Searle, S., Zehetner, G., Wasmuth, J. J., Gusella, J., Lehrach, H., and Frischauf, A. M., 1988, Construction of a NotI linking library and isolation of new markers close to the Huntington’s disease gene, Nucleic Acids Res. 16: 9185–9198.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Richards, J. E., Gilliam, T. C., Cole, J. L., Drumm, M. L., Wasmuth, J. J., Gusella, J., and Collins, F. S., 1988, Chromosome jumping from D4S10 (G8) towards the Huntington’s disease gene, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 85: 6437–6441.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Whaley, W. L., Bates, G. P., Novelleto, A., Sedlacek, Z., Cheng, S., Romano, D., Ormondroyd, E., Allitto, B. A., Lin, C., Youngman, S., Baxendale, S., Bucan, M., Altherr, M., Wasmuth, J., Wexler, N. S., Frontali, M., Frischauf, A. M., Lehrach, H., MacDonald, M. E., and Gusella, J. F., 1991, Mapping of cosmid clones in the Huntington’s disease region of chromosome 4, Somat. Cell. Mol. Genet. 17: 83–91.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Cox, D. R., Pritchard, C. A., Uglum, E., Casher, D., Kobori, J., and Myers, R. M., 1989, Segregation of the Huntington disease region of human chromosome 4 in a somatic cell hybrid, Genomics 4: 397–407.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Pritchard, C. A., Casher, D., Uglum, E., Cox, D. R., and Myers, R. M., 1989, Isolation and field-inversion gel electrophoresis analysis of DNA markers located close to the Huntington disease gene, Genomics 4: 408–418.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Bucan, M., Zimmer, M., Whaley, W. L., Poustka, A., Youngman, S., Allitto, B. A., Ormondroyd, E., Smith, B., Pohl, T. M., MacDonald, M., Bates, G., Richards, J., Volinia, S., Gilliam, T. C., Sedlacek, Z., Collins, F. S., Wasmuth, J. J., Shaw, D. J., Gusella, J. F., Frischauf, A. M., and Lehrach, H., 1990, Physical maps of 4pl6.3, the area expected to contain the Huntington’s disease mutation, Genomics 6: 1–15.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • MacDonald, M. E., Haines, J. L., Zimmer, M., Cheng, S. V., Youngman, S., Whaley, W. L., Bucan, W. L., Allitto, B. A., Smith, B., Leavitt, J., Poustka, A. M., Harper, P., Lehrach, H., Wasmuth, J. J., Frischauf, A. M., and Gusella, J. F., 1989, Recombination events suggest possible locations for the Huntington’s disease gene, Neuron 3: 183–190.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Allitto, B. A., MacDonald, M. E., Bucan, M., Richards, J., Romano, D., Whaley, W. L., Falcone, B., Ianazzi, J., Wexler, N. S., Wasmuth, J. J., Collins, F. S., Lehrach, H., Haines, J. L., and Gusella, J. F., 1991, Increased recombination adjacent to the Huntington’s disease-linked D4S10 marker, Genomics 9: 104–112.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Youngman, S., Sarafarazi, M., Bucan, M., MacDonald, M., Smith, B., Zimmer, M., Gilliam, C., Frischauf, A. M., Wasmuth, J. J., Gusella, J. F., Lehrach, H., Harper, P. S., Shaw, D. J., 1989, A new DNA marker [D4S90] is terminally located on the short arm of chromosome 4 close to the Huntington’s disease gene, Genomics 5: 802–809.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Robbins, C., Theilmann, J., Youngman, S., Haines, J., Altherr, M. J., Harper, P. S., Payne, C., Junker, A., Wasmuth, J., and Hayden, M. R., 1989, Evidence from family studies that the gene causing Huntington disease is telomeric to D4S95 and D4S90, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 44: 422–425.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bates, G. P., MacDonald, M. E., Baxendale, S., Sedlacek, Z., Youngman, S., Romano, D., Whaley, W. L., Allitto, B. A., Poustka, A., Gusella, J. F., and Lehrach, H., 1990, A YAC telomere clone spanning a possible location of the Huntington’s disease gene, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 46: 762–775.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Pritchard, C., Casher, D., Bull, L., Cox, D. R., and Myers, R. M., 1990, A cloned DNA segment from the telomeric region of human chromosome 4p is not detectably rearranged in Huntington disease patients, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 87: 7309–7313.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Snell, R. G., Lazarou, L., Youngman, S., Quarrell, O. W. J., Wasmuth, J. J., Shaw, D. J., and Harper, P. S., 1989, Linkage disequilibrium in Huntington’s disease: An improved localization for the gene, J. Med. Genet. 26: 673–675.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Theilmann, J., Kanani, S., Shiang, R., Robbins, C., Quarrell, O., Huggins, M., Hedrick, A., Weber, B., Collins, C., Wasmuth, J., Buetow, K. H., Murray, J. C., and Hayden, M., 1989, Non-random association between alleles detected at D4S95 and D4S98 and the Huntington’s disease gene, J. Med. Genet. 26: 676–681.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Myers, R. H., Leavitt, J., Farrer, L. A., Jagadeesh, J., McFarlane, H., Mark, R. J., and Gusella, J. F., 1989, Homozygote for Huntington’s disease, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 45: 615–618.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • MacDonald, M. E., Cheng, S. V., Zimmer, M., Haines, J. L., Poustka, A. M., Allitto, B. A., Smith, B., Whaley, W. L., Romano, D., Jagadeesh, J., Lehrach, H., Wasmuth, J. J., Frischauf, A. M., and Gusella, J. F., 1989, Clustering of multi-allele DNA markers near the Huntington’s disease gene, J. Clin. Inv. 84: 1013–1016.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 1991 Plenum Press, New York

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Gusella, J.F. (1991). Huntington’s Disease. In: Harris, H., Hirschhorn, K. (eds) Advances in Human Genetics. Advances in Human Genetics, vol 20. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-5958-6_3

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-5958-6_3

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4684-5960-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4684-5958-6

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

Publish with us

Policies and ethics