Cure Alzheimer's Fund Cure Alzheimer's Fund

Mathew Blurton-Jones, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Neurobiology and Behavior; Faculty, UC Irvine Institute for Memory Impairments and Neurological Disorders (UCI MIND), University of California, Irvine

Dr. Matt Blurton-Jones is an associate professor in the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) and director of the UCI ADRC iPS cell core and the UCI Stem Cell CRISPR core. His current research utilizes human induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells and chimeric mouse models to examine the underlying molecular mechanisms that drive the development and progression of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). His earlier studies were among the first to show that neural stem cells can improve cognitive and motor function in transgenic models of neurodegeneration by elevating levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and enhancing plasticity. His lab also demonstrated that the adaptive immune system restrains the development of AD pathology by modulating microglial activation states. More recently, his group developed one of the leading approaches to differentiate patient-derived iPS cells into microglia (Abud et. al., Neuron, 2017) and generated chimeric models to study human microglial function in vivo (Hasselmann et. al., Neuron, 2019). Ongoing work in the Blurton-Jones lab is now combining iPS cells, CRISPR gene editing, and chimeric modeling to examine the impact of AD-associated genes on human microglial function (McQuade et al., Nat Comm, 2020).

Related Research:

Engineered CAR-Macrophages to Clear Tau Marc Diamond Mathew Blurton-Jones 2025-02-24 Neuroimmune Consortium: Examining the Impact of Peripherally Derived Human Macrophages in Alzheimer’s Disease Pathogenesis Mathew Blurton-Jones 2024-01-11 Neuroimmune Consortium: Examining the Role of Human Microglia in the Transition Between Parenchymal and Vascular Amyloid Beta Pathology Mathew Blurton-Jones 2020-12-18

Funded Research

These projects were made possible from Cure Alzheimer's Fund support.

Project Description Researchers Funding
Engineered CAR-Macrophages to Clear Tau 2025

$460,000

Neuroimmune Consortium: Examining the Impact of Peripherally Derived Human Macrophages in Alzheimer’s Disease Pathogenesis 2023, 2025

$574,983
Neuroimmune Consortium: Examining the Role of Human Microglia in the Transition Between Parenchymal and Vascular Amyloid Beta Pathology 2020, 2022

$500,000

Selected Publications

These published papers resulted from Cure Alzheimer’s Fund support.

Brandao, W., Jain, N., Yin, Z., Kleemann, K. L., … Ulrich, J. D., Blurton-Jones, M., Ilin, I., Weiner., H. L., Holtzman, D. M., Butovsky, O. Inhaled xenon modulates microglia and ameliorates disease in mouse models of amyloidosis and tauopathy, Science Translational Medicine, January 15, 2025, Read More

Profaci, C. P., Harvey, S. S., Bajc, K., Zhang, T. Z., Jeffrey, D. A., Zhang, A. Z., Nemec, K. M., Davtyan, H., O'Brien, C. A., McKinsey, G. L., Longworth, A., McMullen, T. P., Capocchi, J. K., Gonzalez, J. G., Lawson, D. A., Arnold, T. D., Davalos, D., Blurton-Jones, M., Dabertrand, F., Bennett, F. C., Daneman, R. Microglia are not necessary for maintenance of blood-brain barrier properties in health, but PLX5622 alters brain endothelial cholesterol metabolism, Neuron, August 8, 2024, Read More

Rosenzweig, N., Kleemann, K. L., Rust, T., Carpenter, M., Grucci, M., Aronchik, M., Brouwer, N., Valenbreder, I., Cooper-Hohn, J., Iyer, M., Krishnan, R. K., Sivanathan, K. N., Brandão, W., Yahya, T., Durao, A., Yin, Z., Chadarevian, J. P., Properzi, M. J., Nowarski, R., Davtyan, H., Weiner, L. H., Blurton Jones, M., … Butovsky, O. Sex-dependent APOE4 neutrophil–microglia interactions drive cognitive impairment in Alzheimer’s disease, Nature Medicine, July 3, 2024, Read More

Chadarevian, J. P., Hasselmann, J., Lahian, A., Capocchi, J. K., Escobar, A., Lim, T. E., Le, L., Tu, C., Nguyen, J., Kiani Shabestari, S., Carlen-Jones, W., Gandhi, S., Bu, G., Hume, D. A., Pridans, C., Wszolek, Z. K., Spitale, R. C., Davtyan, H., & Blurton-Jones, M. Therapeutic potential of human microglia transplantation in a chimeric model of CSF1R-related leukoencephalopathy, Neuron, June 18, 2024, Read More

Kang, Y. J., Hyeon, S. J., McQuade, A., Lim, J., Baek, S. H., Diep, Y. N., Do, K. V., Jeon, Y., Jo, D. G., Lee, C. J., Blurton-Jones, M., Ryu, H., & Cho, H. Neurotoxic Microglial Activation via IFNγ-Induced Nrf2 Reduction Exacerbating Alzheimer’s Disease, Advanced Science, March 14, 2024, Read More

Eskandari-Sedighi, G., & Blurton-Jones, M. Microglial APOE4: more is less and less is more, Molecular Neurodegeneration, December 19, 2023, Read More

Han, C. Z., Li, R. Z., Hansen, E., Trescott, S., Fixsen, B. R., Nguyen, C. T., Mora, C. M., Spann, N. J., Bennett, H. R., Poirion, O., Buchanan, J., Warden, A. S., Xia, B., Schlachetzki, J. C. M., Pasillas, M. P., Preissl, S., Wang, A., O'Connor, C., Shriram, S., Kim, R., … Coufal, N. G. Human microglia maturation is underpinned by specific gene regulatory networks, Immunity, August 14, 2023, Read More

Dolan, M. J., Therrien, M., Jereb, S., Kamath, T., Gazestani, V., Atkeson, T., Marsh, S. E., Goeva, A., Lojek, N. M., Murphy, S., White, C. M., Joung, J., Liu, B., Limone, F., Eggan, K., Hacohen, N., Bernstein, B. E., Glass, C. K., Leinonen, V., Blurton-Jones, M., … Stevens, B. Exposure of iPSC-derived human microglia to brain substrates enables the generation and manipulation of diverse transcriptional states in vitro, Nature Immunology, July 27, 2023, Read More

Paolicelli, R. C., Sierra, A., Stevens, B., et al. Microglia states and nomenclature: A field at its crossroads, Neuron, November 2, 2022, Read More

Kiani Shabestari, S., Morabito, S., Danhash, E. P., McQuade, A., Sanchez, J. R., Miyoshi, E., Chadarevian, J. P., Claes, C., Coburn, M. A., Hasselmann, J., Hidalgo, J., Tran, K. N., Martini, A. C., Chang Rothermich, W., Pascual, J., Head, E., Hume, D. A., Pridans, C., Davtyan, H., Swarup, V., … Blurton-Jones, M. Absence of microglia promotes diverse pathologies and early lethality in Alzheimer’s disease mice, Cell Reports, June 14, 2022, Read More

Claes, C., England, W. E., Danhash, E. P., Kiani Shabestari, S., Jairaman, A., Chadarevian, J. P., Hasselmann, J., Tsai, A. P., Coburn, M. A., Sanchez, J., Lim, T. E., Hidalgo, J. L. S., Tu, C., Cahalan, M. D., Lamb, B. T., Landreth, G. E., Spitale, R. C., Blurton-Jones, M., & Davtyan, H. The P522R protective variant of PLCG2 promotes the expression of antigen presentation genes by human microglia in an Alzheimer’s disease mouse model, Alzheimer's & Dementia, February 9, 2022, Read More

You, Y., Muraoka, S., Jedrychowski, M. P., Hu, J., McQuade, A. K., Young-Pearse, T., Aslebagh, R., Shaffer, S. A., Gygi, S. P., Blurton-Jones, M., Poon, W. W., & Ikezu, T. Human neural cell type-specific extracellular vesicle proteome defines disease-related molecules associated with activated astrocytes in Alzheimer’s disease brain, Journal of Extracellular Vesicles, January 13, 2022, Read More

McQuade, A., Kang, Y. J., Hasselmann, J., Jairaman, A., Sotelo, A., Coburn, M., Shabestari, S. K., Chadarevian, J. P., Fote, G., Tu, C. H., Danhash, E., Silva, J., Martinez, E., Cotman, C., Prieto, G. A., Thompson, L. M., Steffan, J. S., Smith, I., Davtyan, H., Cahalan, M., … Cho, H., Blurton-Jones, M. Gene expression and functional deficits underlie TREM2-knockout microglia responses in human models of Alzheimer’s disease, Nature Communications, October 23, 2020, Read More

Liu T, Zhu B, Liu Y, Zhang X, Yin J, Li X, Jiang L, Hodges AP, Rosenthal SB, Zhou L, Yancey J, McQuade A, Blurton-Jones M, Tanzi RE, Huang TY, Xu H. Multi-omic comparison of Alzheimer’s variants in human ESC–derived microglia reveals convergence at APOE, Journal of Experimental Medicine, September 17, 2020, Read More

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