Importantly, protoplasmic astrocytes that accumulated alpha-synuclein in PD cases did not appear to be activated, whereas deposition of alpha-synuclein in protoplasmic astrocytes coincided with hallmarks of astrogliosis in brains from patients affected by another parkinsonian syndrome, progressive supranuclear palsy (Song et al., 2009). The gene discussed is SNCA; the disease is Parkinson disease.