Unmasking early microglial remodeling in an Alzheimer's disease mouse model.

ABSTRACT: Early neuroimmune remodeling is a critical yet understudied component of Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathogenesis. To investigate microglial contributions to AD development prior to overt plaque deposition, we developed an open-source morphometric pipeline to systematically quantify hippocampal microglial structure and activation states in pre-plaque 5xFAD mice. Across ∼11,000 cells, we extracted multidimensional parameters including area, circularity, convex hull, branch points, nearest-neighbor distance, and nuclear features, alongside Iba1 and CD68 intensity measurements. While no significant overt gliosis was observed at this early stage, microglia from 5xFAD mice exhibited subtle trends toward increased structural complexity compared to wild-type controls. Importantly, significant sex-sp

SUBMITTER: Saminathan P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12807895 | biostudies-literature | 2025

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature