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Comment
. 2020 Aug 17;39(16):e105924.
doi: 10.15252/embj.2020105924. Epub 2020 Jul 23.

Please eat (only part) of me: synaptic phosphatidylserine cues microglia to feast: Two new studies identify how a common apoptotic cell flag is used to sculpt neural circuits

Graham Peet  1 , F Chris Bennett  1 , Mariko L Bennett  2   3
Affiliations
Comment

Please eat (only part) of me: synaptic phosphatidylserine cues microglia to feast: Two new studies identify how a common apoptotic cell flag is used to sculpt neural circuits

Graham Peet et al. EMBO J. .

Abstract

Microglia, the brain's tissue-resident macrophages, contribute to the developmental elimination of extranumerary synapses and to pathologic synapse loss in mouse models of neurodegeneration. Two papers published in The EMBO Journal reveal that phosphatidylserine (PS) is a neuronal cue for microglial synapse elimination.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Microglial synapse pruning is triggered by locally exposed phosphatidylserine
Phosphatidylserine (PS), normally cytoplasm‐facing, is locally exposed in a subset of synapses during development. Microglia detect exposed PS at presynapses through TREM2 and GPR56. Synapses with exposed PS are then preferentially engulfed by microglia during eye‐specific segregation. This mechanism interacts with previously described complement‐mediated targeting of synapses in as yet undefined ways.
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