Ace Therapeutics is dedicated to providing important glial cell models, including oligodendrocytes, astrocytes and microglia, to pharmaceutical and biotechnology organizations working to cure schizophrenia. We can also provide comprehensive gene expression analysis and neurotoxicity testing based on these cells to accelerate your drug development process.

Introduction of Glial Cell Model Development for Schizophrenia

Evidence for the importance of glial cells for the development and structure of local neural networks suggests that the assumption that higher brain function consists solely of the combined product of neuronal activity is challenged. Macroglia (including oligodendrocytes, glial progenitor cells, and astrocytes) and microglia contribute to the regulation and synchronization of neuronal activity.

Fig. 1 A unified gliocentric model of schizophrenia. (Dietz AG, et al., 2020)

Why We Choose Glial Cells for Schizophrenia Research?

Failure of glial cell differentiation is the initial event in schizophrenia, while astrocyte proliferation and microglia proliferation may occur as secondary events later in disease development, possibly due to disrupted network connectivity, dysregulated homeostasis of glutamate and potassium regulation, changes in neuromodulator release, neuroinflammatory triggers, sleep deprivation, and drug-related effects. Taken together, these functional roles, the evolution of astrocyte complexity and phylogeny, and the co-occurrence of neuropsychiatric disorders with primitive human evolution suggest an important contribution of glial pathology to psychiatric disorders.

Glial Cell Model Development Services

Ace Therapeutics offers a range of human, mouse and rat glial cell models. With years of experience in primary neural cell isolation, we can provide ready-to-use, high quality neural cells for your research. Extensive testing and optimization ensure the quality and performance of each batch of cell models we produce. In addition, we offer a wide range of standardized cell culture systems for in vitro research, including oligodendrocytes, astrocytes and microglia. We can also develop and validate new models based on your requirements. In our cell culture systems, we simulate schizophrenia and psychosis-related lesions. In addition, we perform drug safety testing and have several systems that can be used to screen for inhibitors of psychiatric disorders.

We offer the following glial cell models and analytical services based on these cell models:

• Oligodendrocyte models: Oligodendrocytes communicate with other cell types in the central nervous system in a variety of ways, and oligodendrocytes secrete trophic factors that regulate neuronal axon size and modulate the distribution of ion channels in axons. Oligodendrocyte marker analysis and oligodendrocyte differentiation analysis can be used for schizophrenia research.
• Astrocyte models: Astrocytes are essential for regulating multiple homeostatic functions that determine the precision of synaptic activity. Changes in astrocyte number and morphological phenotype can be used to study cognitive dysfunction caused by psychiatric disorders.
• Microglia model: Activated microglia lead to defects in macroglia differentiation, which is characteristic of schizophrenia. Microglia activation and neuroinflammation are used to study disease progression in schizophrenia.

Ace Therapeutics is committed to providing attractive resources for in vitro modeling of psychiatric disorders, toxicity screening, and drug screening. If you are interested in our services, please make an inquiry to send your request to develop a customized strategy to support your research program.

Reference

1. Dietz AG, Goldman SA, Nedergaard M. Glial cells in schizophrenia: a unified hypothesis. Lancet Psychiatry. 2020, 7(3):272-281.