Research Group Melanie Greter

Keywords

Macrophages, microglia, preclinical glioma models, cytokines

Summary & Mission statement

Our research group is interested in the development, regulation and function of mononuclear phagocytes in health and disease. We aim to understand the origin, phenotype and role of the different populations of tumor-associated macrophages for the development of glioma in preclinical glioma models.

Overview

Macrophages are professional phagocytes critical for innate immune defense and participate in development and organ homeostasis. Tissue resident macrophages display heterogeneity in terms of origin, phenotype, subtissular location and function. In cancer, tumor-associated macrophages can have pro- or anti-tumorigenic properties. Glioma are characterized by a high number of tumor-associated macrophages, yet little is known about the function of the different subsets of macrophages, including monocyte-derived macrophages and tumor-infiltrating CNS-resident macrophages. Our goal is to interrogate the ontogeny, phenotype and functions of the different macrophage populations in a preclinical model of glioma, with a particular focus on the brain-resident macrophages including perivascular macrophages adjacent to blood vessels and microglia in the brain parenchyma.

Resident central nervous system (CNS) macrophages comprise microglia in the CNS parenchyma and perivascular macrophages (PVM) in perivascular spaces (PVS) of bood vessels. Glioma contains different subsets of macrophages including CNS-resident macrophages and monocyte-derived macrophages (MdM).