Characterizing the metabolomes of microglia, astrocytes, and neurons in aging and Alzheimer’s brains

Neurons and glia are distinct in their morphology, development, and function, possessing unique transcriptomes and proteomes, but little is known about their metabolomes. The challenge of brain cell metabolic profiling is to obtain a large number of cells for reliable analysis. Here, we purified microglia, astrocytes, and neurons from mouse brains, identifying >70 metabolites through targeted metabolomics and 9,854 metabolite features via untargeted metabolomics. We systematically characterized cell type–enriched metabolites and metabolic pathways, revealing an enrichment of glutathione (GSH) and polyamine metabolism in microglia. This enrichment was validated in vivo and showed significant decreases with aging and in an Alzheimer’s disease (AD) model. Notably, GSH and polyamine metabolism correlated strongly with chemokine-related gene expression. Disrupting the GSH pathway in microglia resulted in downregulation of chemokine-related genes, aberrant morphogenesis, and β-amyloid deposition. Our results provide a valuable resource ( https://metabolismocean.org/braincell ) for metabolic studies related to aging, AD, and other neurological diseases.