On the basis of the protective role shown by both these small heat shock proteins (sHSPs), and on the already well established neuroprotective effects of curcumin in several diseases, we have investigated the effects of this compound in an in vitro model of Alexander disease, consisting in U251-MG astrocytoma cells transiently transfected with a construct encoding for GFAP carrying the p.R239C mutation in frame with the reporter green fluorescent protein (GFP).