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Regional microglial populations in central autonomic brain regions in SUDEP

Somani, A; El-Hachami, H; Patodia, S; Sisodiya, S; Thom, M; (2021) Regional microglial populations in central autonomic brain regions in SUDEP. Epilepsia 10.1111/epi.16904. (In press). Green open access

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Abstract

OBJECTIVE: Sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP) may arise as a result of autonomic dysfunction during a seizure. The central autonomic networks (CANs) modulate brainstem cardiorespiratory regulation. Recent magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies in SUDEP have shown cortical and subcortical volume changes and altered connectivity between CAN regions, but the pathological correlate is unknown. Because neuroinflammation is both a cause and a consequence of seizures and may relate to regional brain pathology, our aim was to evaluate microglial populations in CANs in SUDEP. METHODS: In 55 postmortem cases, including SUDEP, epilepsy controls without SUDEP and nonepilepsy controls, we quantified Iba1-expressing microglia in 14 cortical and thalamic areas that included known CAN regions. RESULTS: Mean Iba1 labeling across all brain regions was significantly higher in SUDEP cases compared to epilepsy and nonepilepsy controls. There was significant regional variation in Iba1 labeling in SUDEP cases only, with highest labeling in the medial thalamus. Significantly higher labeling in SUDEP cases than epilepsy and nonepilepsy controls was consistently noted in the superior temporal gyrus. In cases with documented seizures up to 10 days prior to death, significantly higher mean Iba1 labeling was observed in SUDEP compared to epilepsy controls. SIGNIFICANCE: Our findings support microglial activation in SUDEP, including cortical and subcortical regions with known autonomic functions such as the thalamus and superior temporal gyrus. This may be relevant to cellular pathomechanisms underlying cardioregulatory failure during a seizure.

Type: Article
Title: Regional microglial populations in central autonomic brain regions in SUDEP
Location: United States
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1111/epi.16904
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1111/epi.16904
Language: English
Additional information: This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution‐NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes. See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Keywords: Iba1, SUDEP, central autonomic networks, microglia
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology > Clinical and Experimental Epilepsy
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10127696
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