Physiological alterations in microglial morphology associate with the sleep-wake cycle in a brain region-specific manner

Long-term total sleep deprivation induces changes in cortical - and hippocampal microglial morphology that closely resemble the microglial response to the gram-negative bacterial cell wall component lipopolysaccharide (LPS). A recent study found evidence that microglia could modify vigilance-states/sleep, but only few studies investigated microglial throughout the diurnal behavioral inactivity/activity pattern or the naturally occurring sleep-wake cycle, and those who have, only concentrated on the cortical or hippocampal microglia. As microglia demonstrate regional heterogeneity, we compared microglial diurnal morphological alterations in the somatosensory cortex (SC) and dorsal hippocampus (HC) to the basal forebrain (BF), which is a subcortical brain area involved in the regulation of vigilance states. We collected mouse brain samples every 3h throughout the 24h light-dark-cycle and applied a 3D reconstruction method for the acquired confocal microscopy images for each brain area separately. While microglial regional heterogeneity was evident, stimulation of microglia with LPS caused comparable microglial responses in all brain areas. When comparing microglial features between the 12h light- and dark periods, regional heterogeneity re-appeared. As most of the morphological alterations occurred during the light period-the habitual sleeping period of the mice, we performed polysomnography to study the possible interaction of microglial morphology and sleep. We found that cortical-, but not HC- or BF microglial territory and volume negatively correlated with sleep slow wave activity (SWA), an electroencephalic feature of non-REM sleep (NREMS). Since microglia are sensitive to neuronal activity, we propose that the regional differences reflect vigilance-state specific neuronal activity patterns. Table of contents image O_FIG O_LINKSMALLFIG WIDTH=184 HEIGHT=200 SRC="FIGDIR/small/482976v1_ufig1.gif" ALT="Figure 1"> View larger version (71K): org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@112d346org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@ecc138org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@1817331org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@1b1b47c_HPS_FORMAT_FIGEXP M_FIG C_FIG Main PointsMicroglia show morphological differences between the somatosensory cortex (SC), hippocampus (HC) and basal forebrain (BF) under physiological conditions. Cortical-, but not HC- or BF microglial cell volume negatively correlates with non-REM sleep slow wave activity.