Scientists have successfully drawn the "methylation blueprint" of microglia in the human brain

In the central nervous system, microglia play a very key role in development, aging, brain homeostasis, and pathological mechanisms.

Microglia are the brain’s own immune cells.

DNA methylation is the main form of epigenetic regulation, which determines the pattern of genes being turned on or off in a variety of situations over time; in the article, researchers donated to 22 donors of different ages The microglia isolated from the brain tissues after death were analyzed.

The researchers pointed out that microglia can exhibit DNA methylation characteristics that are different from other cells in the central nervous system, but differences between individuals (rather than differences in brain regions) have a greater impact on changes in DNA methylation.

In summary, the results of this study show that although based on a relatively small number of samples, the methylation characteristics of microglia are responsive to changes between individuals, so the microglia observed at the transcriptomics level The heterogeneity of cells plays a very important role

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