Fig. 6: Silencing of Acod1 expression in microglia.

a Treatment schedule. Hippocampal stereotactic injection of Acod1^–-adeno-associated virus (AAV); brain collection 22 days post-infection. Behavioral assessments were conducted 28 days post-infection. Western blot (b) and quantification (c) of cGAS and STING in hippocampus of mice treated with control or Acod1^–-AAV (n = 6). d, e Representative transmission electron microscopy (TEM) of synapse and mitochondria in CA1 region in mice treated with control or Acod1^–-AAV (n = 6). Western blot (f) and quantification (g) of cGAS and STING in hippocampus of mice received control or Acod1^–-AAV (n = 6). Representative 3D reconstructed imaging (h) and quantitative analysis (i) of microglia engulfing synapses (n = 6). Green, Iba-1; Red, PSD95; Magenta, CD68. Scale bar, 5 μm. Western blot (j) and quantification (k) of K150 in the hippocampus of mice treated with control or Acod1^–-AAV (n = 6). l Western blot image of STING ubiquitination levels in mouse hippocampus. m Schematic of mechanism. Data are shown as mean ± SD. ^*P < 0.05, ^**P < 0.01, ^***P < 0.001, ^****P < 0.0001. ns, not significant. P values were calculated using two-sided Student’s unpaired t-tests (c, e, g, i, k). AZ active zone, SC synaptic cleft, SV synaptic vesicles, PSD postsynaptic density. Source data and exact P values are provided as a Source Data file. a includes components created in BioRender. Wu, Y. (2025) https://BioRender.com/rin8c1c.