17β-estradiol alleviated ferroptotic neuroinflammation by suppressing ATF4 in mouse model of Parkinson’s disease

Abstract Neuroinflammation induced by activation of microglial is a vital contributor to progression of Parkinson’s disease (PD), emerging evidences suggested that ferroptosis played a pivotal role in microglial activation and subsequent dopaminergic neuron loss. Nevertheless, the fundamental pathogenesis of that ferroptosis contributes to PD is not yet sufficiently understood. Based on GEO dataset, ferroptosis related genes were found to be enriched in PD patients and MPTP mouse model of PD, among them, ATF4 was found to be dramatically differentially expressed. In our study, ectopic expression of ATF4 augmented MPP + -induced cytotoxic and activation of BV2 cells with upregulated intracellular L-ROS, TLR4 and pNF-κB. Ectopic ATF4 effectively promoted transformation of microglial into M1 pro-inflammatory phenotype. 17β-estradiol (E2) attenuated expression of ATF4 in BV2 cells, silence of ATF4 enhanced protective effect of E2 on MPP + -treated BV2 cells. In MPTP-induced PD mouse model, administration of E2 further abated expression of ATF4 and inhibited expressions of pro-inflammatory cytokines and activation of TLR4/NF-κB pathway. Overall, E2 effectively counteracted TLR4/NF-κB signaling pathway by restraining ATF4 and inhibited inflammatory response triggered by ferroptosis, ultimately exerted anti-PD effects.