We have long promulgated the idea that microglial cells serve an entirely beneficial role in the central nervous system (CNS), not only as immunological sentinels to fend off potentially dangerous infections, but also as constitutively neuroprotective glia that help sustain neuronal function in the normal and especially in the injured CNS when microglia become activated. In recent years, we hav...

Objectives: Microglial cells are the central regulators of inflammatory responses in brain and spinal cord. In addition to surveillance during resting state, they become activated due microbial molecules pathological insults. Endogenously expressed Activated protein C (APC) is an anticoagulant molecule with anti-inflammatory cytoprotective roles, mediated by one its receptors, Endothelial recep...

background: microglial cells act as the sentinel of the central nervous system .they are involved in neuroprotection but are highly implicated in neurodegeneration of the aging brain. when over-activated, microglia release pro-inflammatory factors, such as nitric oxide (no) and cytokines, which are critical in eliciting neuroinflammatory responses associated with neurodegenerative diseases. thi...

Microglia, central nervous system (CNS) resident phagocytic cells, persistently police the integrity of CNS tissue and respond to any kind of damage and pathophysiological changes. These cells sense and rapidly respond to danger and inflammatory signals by changing their cell morphology, by release of cytokines, chemokines or nitric oxide, and by changing their MHC expression profile. We have s...

Microglia and Müller cells are glial cells of the retina and constitute a functional link between neurons and vessels. The aim of the present study was to introduce a novel method of co-culture with Müller cells and microglia in rat retina. A camera was used to analyze all the cell changes. Immunofluorescence staining of glutamine synthetase and OX-42 were used for the identification of Müller ...

Blockade of the retrograde axonal transport of isthmo-optic nucleus (ION) neurons in the avian embryo results in their massive degeneration. We used this system to investigate the response of macrophage/microglial cells to neuronal degeneration in the embryonic brain. Colchicine was injected into the right eye of quail or chick embryos at a time when the survival of ION neurons depends on retro...

Microglial cells are difficult to track during development because of the lack of specific reagents for myeloid subpopulations. To further understand how myeloid lineages differentiate during development to create microglial cells, we investigated CX3CR1 and CCR2 transcription unit activation in Cx3cr1(+/GFP)CCR2(+/RFP) knockin fluorescent protein reporter mice. The principal findings include: ...

After traumatic brain lesion, microglial cells are rapidly activated, migrate toward the sites of injury, and cause secondary damage that accounts for most of the loss of brain function. In the present study, we have characterized a new macrophage/microglia activation factor (MAF). Using the monocytic cell line U937, we were able to demonstrate that MAF is upregulated after TPA-induced differen...

The presence of autoreactive T cells recognizing self myelin antigens is necessary for the development of central nervous system autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis (MS). The present study was undertaken to investigate the role of myelin basic protein (MBP)-primed T cells in the expression of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) in microglial cells. MBP-primed T cells alone markedl...