Animals

Male mice at 120 ± 2 days old of age were used, unless otherwise specified. Mice were bred and reared under the same conditions in accordance with institutional guidelines and the Animal Care and Use Committee (Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China) of the university’s animal core facility (UAC) and housed in groups of three to five mice/cage under a 12-h light-dark cycle, with lights on at 8:00 am, at a consistent ambient temperature (21 ± 1 °C) and humidity (50 ± 5%). All experiments and analyses were performed blind to the genotype or treatment. AD (Tg2576-APPswe) mice, ChAT-Cre knock-in mice (stock No: 006410) and Nestin-Cre^ER mice (stock No: 016261) were purchased from Jackson Laboratory (Bar Harbor, ME, USA) and were identified as homozygous and bred at the UAC. The strains of the mutant mice used in this study are listed in the Supplementary Table ¹ and the methods for breeding are described in the figure legend.