Glial Fibrillary Acidic Protein Simoa

GFAP is a type III intermediate filament produced mainly by astrocytes, other glial cells, and neural stem cells. There are currently 10 splice isoforms identified, with the following found in humans: GFAPa, ?, d, ?, ?, ?135, ?164, ?exon6, and ?exon7. GFAPa is the most abundant and well-studied isoform. GFAP forms homopolymeric and heteroploymeric filaments with other type III intermediate filaments such as nestin, synemin, and vimentin. To date, the function of GFAP has not been fully elucidated, although it has been linked to various cell functions, such as migration, motility, mitosis, cell integrity, and cell signaling. GFAP is a marker for mature astrocytes and is elevated when astrocytes become activated during disease states. Due to these observations, GFAP is an emerging biomarker for several neurological diseases. GFAP increases have been identified in Alzheimer?s, Parkinson?s, Huntington?s, after brain injury, epilepsy, and neurological cancers. Several studies have indicated the potential of GFAP as a biomarker for traumatic brain injury, which has continuously suffered setbacks for clinical therapy due to, in part, the lack of a robust diagnostic marker. It has proven useful to predict CT findings and pathological alterations, shown that elevation post-trauma can define disease severity, and may correlate to patient outcomes. Interestingly, because of the crosstalk between the nervous and immune systems, GFAP may play further roles in immune regulation.

Swiss-Prot Accession Number: P14136