AUTHOR=Schitine Clarissa , Nogaroli Luciana , Costa Marcos R. , Hedin-Pereira Cecilia TITLE=Astrocyte heterogeneity in the brain: from development to disease JOURNAL=Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience VOLUME=9 YEAR=2015 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/cellular-neuroscience/articles/10.3389/fncel.2015.00076 DOI=10.3389/fncel.2015.00076 ISSN=1662-5102 ABSTRACT=

In the last decades, astrocytes have risen from passive supporters of neuronal activity to central players in brain function and cognition. Likewise, the heterogeneity of astrocytes starts to become recognized in contrast to the homogeneous population previously predicted. In this review, we focused on astrocyte heterogeneity in terms of their morphological, protein expression and functional aspects, and debate in a historical perspective the diversity encountered in glial progenitors and how they may reflect mature astrocyte heterogeneity. We discussed data that show that different progenitors may have unsuspected roles in developmental processes. We have approached the functions of astrocyte subpopulations on the onset of psychiatric and neurological diseases.