Analysis of microglial BDNF function and expression in the motor cortex

Diana Honey; Erin Wosnitzka; Eric Klann; Laetitia Weinhard

doi:10.3389/fncel.2022.961276

Analysis of microglial BDNF function and expression in the motor cortex

Front Cell Neurosci. 2022 Dec 23:16:961276. doi: 10.3389/fncel.2022.961276. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Diana Honey^{1

2}, Erin Wosnitzka^{3

4}, Eric Klann², Laetitia Weinhard¹

Affiliations

¹ NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, United States.
² Center for Neural Science, New York University, New York, NY, United States.
³ Department of Fundamental Neurosciences, UNIL, Lausanne, Switzerland.
⁴ Cardiff School of Biosciences, Cardiff University, Wales, United Kingdom.

Abstract

Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) is a neurotrophin that regulates several aspects of brain function. Although numerous studies have demonstrated the expression and function of BDNF in neurons, its expression in microglia remains controversial. Using a combination of genetic tools and fluorescence imaging, we analyzed BDNF expression patterns and investigated the effect of microglial Bdnf deletion on neuronal activity, early-stage spine formation, and microglia-neuron attraction in the motor cortex. We did not detect BDNF expression in microglia at the transcriptional or translational level, in physiological or pathological conditions, and none of the assessed neuronal functions were found to be affected in conditional Bdnf knockout mice. Our results suggest that microglia do not express BDNF in sufficient amounts to modulate neuronal function.

Keywords: BDNF; calcium; microglia; plasticity; spine.

Grants and funding

LW is supported by a postdoctoral HFSP fellowship. DH was supported by a NYU SURP fellowship. EW was supported by the Sêr Cymru program, by the Neuroscience and Mental Health Research Institute PhD program at Cardiff University, and by Boehringer-Ingelheim.