Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder

The amygdala undergoes aberrant development in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We previously found that there are reduced neuron numbers in the adult postmortem amygdala from individuals with ASD compared to typically developing controls. The current study is a comprehensive stereological examinatio...

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Main Authors:	Morgan, John T., Barger, Nicole, Amaral, David G., Schumann, Cynthia M.
Format:	Online
Language:	English
Published:	Public Library of Science 2014
Online Access:	https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4201518/

id	pubmed-4201518
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	pubmed-42015182014-10-21 Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder Morgan, John T. Barger, Nicole Amaral, David G. Schumann, Cynthia M. Research Article The amygdala undergoes aberrant development in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We previously found that there are reduced neuron numbers in the adult postmortem amygdala from individuals with ASD compared to typically developing controls. The current study is a comprehensive stereological examination of four non-neuronal cell populations: microglia, oligodendrocytes, astrocytes, and endothelial cells, in the same brains studied previously. We provide a detailed neuroanatomical protocol for defining each cell type that may be applied to other studies of the amygdala in neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders. We then assess whether cell numbers and average volumes differ between ASD and typically developing brains. We hypothesized that a reduction in neuron numbers in ASD might relate to altered immune function and/or aberrant microglial activation, as indicated by increased microglial number and cell body volume. Overall, average non-neuronal cell numbers and volumes did not differ between ASD and typically developing brains. However, there was evident heterogeneity within the ASD cohort. Two of the eight ASD brains displayed strong microglial activation. Contrary to our original hypothesis, there was a trend toward a positive correlation between neuronal and microglial numbers in both ASD and control cases. There were fewer oligodendrocytes in the amygdala of adult individuals with ASD ages 20 and older compared to typically developing controls. This finding may provide a possible sign of altered connectivity or impaired neuronal communication that may change across the lifespan in ASD. Public Library of Science 2014-10-17 /pmc/articles/PMC4201518/ /pubmed/25330013 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0110356 Text en © 2014 Morgan et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.
repository_type	Open Access Journal
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	US National Center for Biotechnology Information
building	NCBI PubMed
collection	Online Access
language	English
format	Online
author	Morgan, John T. Barger, Nicole Amaral, David G. Schumann, Cynthia M.
spellingShingle	Morgan, John T. Barger, Nicole Amaral, David G. Schumann, Cynthia M. Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder
author_facet	Morgan, John T. Barger, Nicole Amaral, David G. Schumann, Cynthia M.
author_sort	Morgan, John T.
title	Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder
title_short	Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder
title_full	Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder
title_fullStr	Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder
title_full_unstemmed	Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder
title_sort	stereological study of amygdala glial populations in adolescents and adults with autism spectrum disorder
description	The amygdala undergoes aberrant development in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We previously found that there are reduced neuron numbers in the adult postmortem amygdala from individuals with ASD compared to typically developing controls. The current study is a comprehensive stereological examination of four non-neuronal cell populations: microglia, oligodendrocytes, astrocytes, and endothelial cells, in the same brains studied previously. We provide a detailed neuroanatomical protocol for defining each cell type that may be applied to other studies of the amygdala in neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders. We then assess whether cell numbers and average volumes differ between ASD and typically developing brains. We hypothesized that a reduction in neuron numbers in ASD might relate to altered immune function and/or aberrant microglial activation, as indicated by increased microglial number and cell body volume. Overall, average non-neuronal cell numbers and volumes did not differ between ASD and typically developing brains. However, there was evident heterogeneity within the ASD cohort. Two of the eight ASD brains displayed strong microglial activation. Contrary to our original hypothesis, there was a trend toward a positive correlation between neuronal and microglial numbers in both ASD and control cases. There were fewer oligodendrocytes in the amygdala of adult individuals with ASD ages 20 and older compared to typically developing controls. This finding may provide a possible sign of altered connectivity or impaired neuronal communication that may change across the lifespan in ASD.
publisher	Public Library of Science
publishDate	2014
url	https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4201518/
_version_	1613146233889619968

Stereological Study of Amygdala Glial Populations in Adolescents and Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder

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