UC Irvine Alzheimer’s disease researcher Mathew Blurton-Jones will receive $1.15 million to improve the ability to generate and study microglia from human pluripotent stem cells. Microglia serve as the primary immune cells within the brain and are strongly implicated in Alzheimer’s disease and many other brain disorders. Yet until recently, scientists have been unable to produce microglia from human stem cells.
Building upon promising new results, Mathew Blurton-Jones will use the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine funding to generate human pluripotent stem cells with special “reporter” genes that make the cells glow as they become microglia. By using these cells, he believes, researchers will be able to streamline the process of producing microglia from patient skin samples and then use these cells to examine the role of microglia in Alzheimer’s and other brain disorders. Eventually, Blurton-Jones said, he and his colleagues at the Sue & Bill Gross Stem Cell Research Center will utilize the resulting human microglia to address key questions about the causes and potential treatment of Alzheimer’s disease.
Project collaborators are Edsel Abud and Matthew Inlay of UCI, Monica Carson of UC Riverside, and Colin Pouton of Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. The funding is part of the CIRM Tools & Technology Initiative.
Tom Vasich
Director of Research Communications
UC Irvine
tmvasich@uci.edu
www.communications.uci.edu