Profiling microglia from AD donors and non-demented elderly in acute human post-mortem cortical tissue

Abstract

Abstract Microglia are the tissue-resident macrophages of the central nervous system (CNS). Recent studies based on bulk and single-cell RNA sequencing in mice indicate high relevance of microglia with respect to risk genes and neuro-inflammation in Alzheimer’s disease. Here, we investigated microglia transcriptomes at bulk and single cell level in non-demented elderly and AD donors using acute human post-mortem cortical brain samples. We identified 9 human microglial subpopulations with heterogeneity in gene expression. Notably, gene expression profiles and subcluster composition of microglia did not differ between AD donors and non-demented elderly in bulk RNA sequencing nor in single-cell sequencing.