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Unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes
Since the initial description of astrocytes by neuroanatomists of the nineteenth century, a critical metabolic role for these cells has been suggested in the central nervous system. Nonetheless, it took several technological and conceptual advances over many years before we could start to understand...
Autores principales: | , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Frontiers Media S.A.
2013
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Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3795301/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24130515 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fncel.2013.00179 |
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author | Bouzier-Sore, Anne-Karine Pellerin, Luc |
author_facet | Bouzier-Sore, Anne-Karine Pellerin, Luc |
author_sort | Bouzier-Sore, Anne-Karine |
collection | PubMed |
description | Since the initial description of astrocytes by neuroanatomists of the nineteenth century, a critical metabolic role for these cells has been suggested in the central nervous system. Nonetheless, it took several technological and conceptual advances over many years before we could start to understand how they fulfill such a role. One of the important and early recognized metabolic function of astrocytes concerns the reuptake and recycling of the neurotransmitter glutamate. But the description of this initial property will be followed by several others including an implication in the supply of energetic substrates to neurons. Indeed, despite the fact that like most eukaryotic non-proliferative cells, astrocytes rely on oxidative metabolism for energy production, they exhibit a prominent aerobic glycolysis capacity. Moreover, this unusual metabolic feature was found to be modulated by glutamatergic activity constituting the initial step of the neurometabolic coupling mechanism. Several approaches, including biochemical measurements in cultured cells, genetic screening, dynamic cell imaging, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and mathematical modeling, have provided further insights into the intrinsic characteristics giving rise to these key features of astrocytes. This review will provide an account of the different results obtained over several decades that contributed to unravel the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes that make this cell type unique. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-3795301 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2013 |
publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-37953012013-10-15 Unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes Bouzier-Sore, Anne-Karine Pellerin, Luc Front Cell Neurosci Neuroscience Since the initial description of astrocytes by neuroanatomists of the nineteenth century, a critical metabolic role for these cells has been suggested in the central nervous system. Nonetheless, it took several technological and conceptual advances over many years before we could start to understand how they fulfill such a role. One of the important and early recognized metabolic function of astrocytes concerns the reuptake and recycling of the neurotransmitter glutamate. But the description of this initial property will be followed by several others including an implication in the supply of energetic substrates to neurons. Indeed, despite the fact that like most eukaryotic non-proliferative cells, astrocytes rely on oxidative metabolism for energy production, they exhibit a prominent aerobic glycolysis capacity. Moreover, this unusual metabolic feature was found to be modulated by glutamatergic activity constituting the initial step of the neurometabolic coupling mechanism. Several approaches, including biochemical measurements in cultured cells, genetic screening, dynamic cell imaging, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and mathematical modeling, have provided further insights into the intrinsic characteristics giving rise to these key features of astrocytes. This review will provide an account of the different results obtained over several decades that contributed to unravel the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes that make this cell type unique. Frontiers Media S.A. 2013-10-11 /pmc/articles/PMC3795301/ /pubmed/24130515 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fncel.2013.00179 Text en Copyright © Bouzier-Sore and Pellerin. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
spellingShingle | Neuroscience Bouzier-Sore, Anne-Karine Pellerin, Luc Unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes |
title | Unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes |
title_full | Unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes |
title_fullStr | Unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes |
title_full_unstemmed | Unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes |
title_short | Unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes |
title_sort | unraveling the complex metabolic nature of astrocytes |
topic | Neuroscience |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3795301/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24130515 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fncel.2013.00179 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT bouziersoreannekarine unravelingthecomplexmetabolicnatureofastrocytes AT pellerinluc unravelingthecomplexmetabolicnatureofastrocytes |