Microglial control of obesity and diabetes (B10)

• Subject Area: Molecular and Cellular Neurology and Neuropathology
• Term: from 2017 to 2019
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 259373024

Currently about one half billion people are clinically obese. Obesity is not a disease of choice, rather the result of misregulation of neuro-regulatory circuitry controlling energy uptake and expenditure. Very poorly understood, microglial activation has surfaced as a potential causal element of obesity-associated metabolic disease. Here, we aim to genetically dissect first microglial metabolic and signaling machinery driving obesity-associated disease. We will characterize microglial activation to an unprecedented single cell and epigenomic level, define its energetic requirements, and map activation limiting constraints in vivo.

• DFG Programme: CRC/Transregios
• Subproject of: TRR 167: Development, function and potential of myeloid cells in the central nervous system (NeuroMac)
• Applicant Institution: Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg
• Project Head: John Andrew Pospisilik, Ph.D., until 9/2019