Neuroscientist & glia enthusiast; Instructor @SchaferLabUMCMS @UMassChan | PhD @HopkinsNeuro he/him
Worcester, MA
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Thrilled to share our new paper in @CellCellPress:
“Microglia–astrocyte crosstalk regulates synapse remodeling via Wnt signaling”
This work demonstrates the necessity of glia–glia communication and cooperation.
cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092…
Faust et al., Cell 2025
#Neuroscience #Glia
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Excited to share this story from @UMassChan about my @SimonsFdn Fellows-to-Faculty award!
I'm incredibly grateful for the support as I work toward establishing an independent research program studying microglia-astrocyte regulation of synaptic remodeling and brain plasticity.
Travis E. Faust, PhD, is one of 15 early-career scientists to be selected for a Fellows-to-Faculty award. The $600K @SimonsFdn award will support his transition to an independent faculty position and research on brain development and autism: direc.to/pgGd @TravisFaust2
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Travis Faust retweeted
A new study of congenital epilepsy found that depressive psychiatric symptoms—but not seizures—are caused by antioxidant imbalance in brain-supporting astrocyte cells and reduced neuronal activity. @TravisFaust2 scim.ag/4bkFzs5
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ALDH7A1 mutations cause congenital epilepsy (PDE)—but astrocyte-specific loss in mice caused mood-related behaviors, not seizures. Seizure risk traced to the liver.
1 gene. 2 tissues. 2 phenotypes. Neither begins in neurons.
@ScienceAdvances: doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aef67… 1/9
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Beyond PDE, psychiatric symptoms commonly accompany epilepsy, but need not be caused by seizures.
Because astrocyte redox controlled prelimbic activity independently of seizure susceptibility, redox/ion homeostasis may also shape mood-related circuits in other conditions. 8/9
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I began this as a PhD student. Completing the story took an extraordinary team at Johns Hopkins. I’m deeply grateful to Akira Sawa, Dwight Bergles, and all our co-authors for their persistence, insight, and collaboration.
@Lindsay_4c @Agarwalneurolab @AdrianaRamosAm @jedosan 9/9
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Thrilled to share our new paper in @CellCellPress:
“Microglia–astrocyte crosstalk regulates synapse remodeling via Wnt signaling”
This work demonstrates the necessity of glia–glia communication and cooperation.
cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092…
Faust et al., Cell 2025
#Neuroscience #Glia
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Grateful to see our Cell paper highlighted in a new Targetome commentary by Zhao, Agarwal & Bai on microglia→astrocyte Wnt signaling and glial coordination in synaptic pruning.
maxapress.com/article/doi/10…
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Travis Faust retweeted
A study by Dorothy P. Schafer, PhD, and Travis E. Faust, PhD, published in @CellCellPress explains how different cell types in the brain communicate in response to changes in sensory input to the connections between neurons: direc.to/nJHE @SchaferLabUMass @TravisFaust2
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Travis Faust retweeted
Now online! Microglia-astrocyte crosstalk regulates synapse remodeling via Wnt signaling dlvr.it/TN1NQ3
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🔮 Open questions ahead:
What happens when astrocytes change how much they touch synapses in development, sleep, aging, or disease?
Does reduced astrocyte contact generally make synapses easier for microglia to remove?
How do microglia remove less-contacted synapses?
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🙏 Thanks to my mentor @SchaferLabUMass, collaborators @c_eroglu, Pinar Ayata, and @lab_schaefer, and to all my amazing co-authors.
Proud to do this work at @UmassChan and @NeurobioUMass.
💡 Excited to see where glial biology goes next!
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