Sex differences in the astrocyte population beyond the expression of gonosomal genes (discussed for oligodendroglia above) included more LAMA2 in female astrocytes, related to the blood brain barrier, and more CPAMD8 (associated with late-onset Alzheimer’s disease [22]) and heat shock protein gene (HSPA1A, HSPA1B) expression in male astrocytes (Fig. 6h, Additional file 1: Fig. S11). Here, HSPA1B is linked to early-onset autosomal dominant Alzheimer disease.