GFAP and neurodegenerative disease: Upon activation, astrocytes undergo a morphological transformation typified by increased intermediate filament expression (i.e., glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) and vimentin) and reactive astrocytes have been implicated in the pathogenesis of various neurodegenerative diseases (van der Hel et al., 2005; Kulijewicz-Nawrot et al., 2013; Assous et al., 2014).