Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 Apr 28;10(5):1037.
doi: 10.3390/cells10051037.

Age-Dependent Microglial Response to Systemic Infection

Brianna Cyr  1 , Juan Pablo de Rivero Vaccari  1   2
Affiliations

Age-Dependent Microglial Response to Systemic Infection

Brianna Cyr et al. Cells. .

Abstract

Inflammation is part of the aging process, and the inflammatory innate immune response is more exacerbated in older individuals when compared to younger individuals. Similarly, there is a difference in the response to systemic infection that varies with age. In a recent article by Hoogland et al., the authors studied the microglial response to systemic infection in young (2 months) and middle-aged mice (13-14 months) that were challenged with live Escherichia coli to investigate whether the pro- and anti-inflammatory responses mounted by microglia after systemic infection varies with age. Here, we comment on this study and its implications on how inflammation in the brain varies with age.

Keywords: aging; infection; inflammation; microglia; sepsis.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

J.P.d.R.V. is a co-founder and managing member of InflamaCORE, LLC and has patents on inflammasome proteins as biomarkers of injury and disease as well as on targeting inflammasome proteins for therapeutic purposes. J.P.d.R.V. is a scientific advisory board member of ZyVersa Therapeutics.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Expression changes between control/uninfected, young infected, and middle-aged infected mice. Two arrows indicate a greater increase or decrease between young and middle-aged infected groups.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Louveau A., Harris T.H., Kipnis J. Revisiting the Mechanisms of CNS Immune Privilege. Trends Immunol. 2015;36:569–577. doi: 10.1016/j.it.2015.08.006. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Aspelund A., Antila S., Proulx S.T., Karlsen T.V., Karaman S., Detmar M., Wiig H., Alitalo K. A dural lymphatic vascular system that drains brain interstitial fluid and macromolecules. J. Exp. Med. 2015;212:991–999. doi: 10.1084/jem.20142290. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Iliff J.J., Wang M., Liao Y., Plogg B.A., Peng W., Gundersen G.A., Benveniste H., Vates G.E., Deane R., Goldman S.A., et al. A Paravascular Pathway Facilitates CSF Flow Through the Brain Parenchyma and the Clearance of Interstitial Solutes, Including Amyloid. Sci. Transl. Med. 2012;4:147ra111. doi: 10.1126/scitranslmed.3003748. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Kipnis J., Gadani S.P., Derecki N.C. Pro-cognitive properties of T cells. Nat. Rev. Immunol. 2012;12:663–669. doi: 10.1038/nri3280. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Dulken B.W., Buckley M.T., Negredo P.N., Saligrama N., Cayrol R., Leeman D.S., George B.M., Boutet S.C., Hebestreit K., Pluvinage J.V., et al. Single-cell analysis reveals T cell infiltration in old neurogenic niches. Nature. 2019;571:205–210. doi: 10.1038/s41586-019-1362-5. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources