RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Microglia remodel synapses by presynaptic trogocytosis and spine head filopodia induction
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 190975
DO 10.1101/190975
A1 Laetitia Weinhard
A1 Urte Neniskyte
A1 Giulia di Bartolomei
A1 Giulia Bolasco
A1 Pedro Machado
A1 Nicole L. Schieber
A1 Melanie Exiga
A1 Auguste Vadisiute
A1 Angelo Raggioli
A1 Andreas Schertel
A1 Yannick Schwab
A1 Cornelius T. Gross
YR 2017
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/09/19/190975.abstract
AB Microglia are highly motile glial cells that are proposed to mediate synaptic pruning during neuronal circuit formation. Disruption of signaling between microglia and neurons leads to an excess of immature synaptic connections, thought to be the result of impaired phagocytosis of synapses by microglia. However, until now the direct phagocytosis of synapses by microglia has not been reported and fundamental questions remain about the precise synaptic structures and phagocytic mechanisms involved. Here we used light sheet fluorescence microscopy to follow microglia-synapse interactions in developing organotypic hippocampal cultures, complemented by three-dimensional ultrastructural characterization using correlative light and electron microscopy (CLEM). Our findings define a set of dynamic microglia-synapse interactions, including the selective partial phagocytosis, or trogocytosis (trogo-: nibble), of presynaptic structures and the induction of postsynaptic spine head filopodia by microglia. These findings allow us to propose a mechanism for the facilitatory role of microglia in synaptic circuits remodeling and maturation.