Strategies and Tools for Studying Microglial-Mediated Synapse Elimination and Refinement

Synapse elimination is a tightly regulated process, and an aberrant number of synapses both during the early stages of development or later in aging, has been observed in several neurological conditions, including Alzheimer’s disease, schizophrenia or autism. Effective methodological approaches for investigating how supernumerary synapses and apoptotic material are removed from the brain are vital for understanding the underlying mechanisms, and this, in turn, may provide exciting avenues for the development of new treatments. Dr Morini, Dr Filipello and colleagues at Humanitas University and at Washington University in St Louis have recently published a review about the different strategies and tools available to study the role of microglia, the phagocytes of the brain, in neuronal and synaptic substrates phagocytosis.