Desco Menéndez, ManuelCano López, EvaGómez Cruz, Clara2020-03-052020-03-052019-072019-07-05http://hdl.handle.net/10016/29838Microglia are the resident immune cells of the central nervous system. They have been found to play a major role in the development of different neurodegenerative diseases. In the case of Alzheimer’s disease, understanding microglial interactions with Aβ peptides, a major hallmark of the disease, could unveil potential therapeutic targets. In order to study this interaction, it is important to be able to replicate it in vitro. However, there is no current model for microglial cells in vitro. Primary cultures of rodent postnatal microglia are currently the most used in vitro model for microglial cells, as they are the simpler method to obtain large numbers of primary cells. Nevertheless, this study shows that postnatal microglia grown in vitro with granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) do not present the levels of expression of microglial signature markers (TMEM119, FCRLS, P2RY12, TREM2) found in adult microglia in vivo. This microglial signature was also downregulated in postnatal microglia compared to adult microglia. From immunostaining of tissue slices at postnatal day 3 (P3) it was shown that at least one of this characteristic microglial markers (P2RY12) was present in most of the neonatal microglial cells, although it had lower levels of expression than in adult cells. Together, these results show that postnatal microglia have an immature phenotype and that current culture conditions are not able to promote differentiation of these immature cells into an adult phenotype. For this reason, neonatal microglia are currently not a good model for microglial studies concerning diseases that affect the adult brain.engAtribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 3.0 EspañaMicrogliaImmune cellsCentral nervous systemIn vitrobachelor thesisBiología y Biomedicinaopen access