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BRAIN AGING

Astrocytic traffic jams in the aging brain

Nature Aging volume 2, pages 681–683 (2022)Cite this article

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Lee and colleagues reveal a previously unrecognized population of astrocytes in the aged brain with disrupted proteostatic signaling that generates defects in astrocyte morphology, protein trafficking and synapse maintenance in the aging hippocampus.

In their study, Lee et al. used single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) in 2-year-old mouse hippocampi to identify age-related alterations in astrocyte function. This endeavor revealed three distinct clusters of astrocytic cell populations, described as clusters 2, 3 and 6. The authors found that cluster 6 represents a novel population of astrocytes present exclusively in the aged hippocampus that exhibits upregulated expression of genes related to astrocyte homeostasis, synaptogenesis and synapse elimination. The existence of this population raised the question of whether these cells represent a functionally distinct population of aged astrocytes and, if so, whether they contribute to the circuit defects that underlie cognitive decline in the aging brain.

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Fig. 1: A genetically and functionally unique population of hippocampal astrocytes stemming from reduced astrocytic mTOR and proteasome activity appears with advancing age.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Cell Biology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, USA

    Ryan Baumert, Nicholas Brose & Cagla Eroglu

  2. Department of Neurobiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, USA

    Cagla Eroglu

  3. Duke Institute for Brain Sciences (DIBS), Durham, NC, USA

    Cagla Eroglu

  4. Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA

    Cagla Eroglu

Authors
  1. Ryan Baumert
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  2. Nicholas Brose
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  3. Cagla Eroglu
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Correspondence to Cagla Eroglu.

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Baumert, R., Brose, N. & Eroglu, C. Astrocytic traffic jams in the aging brain. Nat Aging 2, 681–683 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43587-022-00270-4

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