Single cell transcriptomic atlas of lung microvascular regeneration after targeted endothelial cell ablation

Abstract

We sought to define the mechanism underlying lung microvascular regeneration in a model of severe acute lung injury (ALI) induced by selective lung endothelial cell ablation. Intratracheal instillation of DT in transgenic mice expressing human diphtheria toxin (DT) receptor targeted to ECs resulted in ablation of >70% of lung ECs, producing severe ALI with near complete resolution by 7 days. Using single-cell RNA sequencing, eight distinct endothelial clusters were resolved, including alveolar aerocytes (aCap) ECs expressing apelin at baseline and general capillary (gCap) ECs expressing the apelin receptor. At 3 days post injury, a novel gCap EC population emerged characterized by de novo expression of apelin, together with the stem cell marker, protein C receptor. These stem-like cells transitioned at 5 days to proliferative endothelial progenitor-like cells, expressing apelin receptor together with the pro-proliferative transcription factor, Foxm1, and were responsible for the rapid replenishment of all depleted EC populations by 7 days post injury. Treatment with an apelin receptor antagonist prevented ALI resolution and resulted in excessive mortality, consistent with a central role for apelin signaling in EC regeneration and microvascular repair. The lung has a remarkable capacity for microvasculature EC regeneration which is orchestrated by newly emergent apelin-expressing gCap endothelial stem-like cells that give rise to highly proliferative, apelin receptor positive endothelial progenitors responsible for regeneration of the lung microvasculature.

Data availability

Sequencing data have been deposited in GEO under accession codes GSE211335.

The following data sets were generated
The following previously published data sets were used

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Rafael Soares Godoy

    Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  2. Nicholas D Cober

    Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-8061-806X
  3. David P Cook

    Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-7639-6724
  4. Emma McCourt

    Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0003-2796-9279
  5. Yupu Deng

    Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  6. Liyuan Wang

    Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  7. Kenny Schlosser

    Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  8. Katelynn Rowe

    Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  9. Duncan J Stewart

    Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Canada
    For correspondence
    djstewart@ohri.ca
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-9113-8691

Funding

Canadian Institutes of Health Research (FDN - 143291)

  • Duncan J Stewart

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Ethics

Animal experimentation: All animal procedures were approved by the University of Ottawa Animal Care Ethics Committee in agreement with guidelines from the Canadian Council for the Care of Laboratory Animals under protocol OHRI-2747.

Copyright

© 2023, Godoy et al.

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

Metrics

  • 2,547
    views
  • 416
    downloads
  • 13
    citations

Views, downloads and citations are aggregated across all versions of this paper published by eLife.

Download links

A two-part list of links to download the article, or parts of the article, in various formats.

Downloads (link to download the article as PDF)

Open citations (links to open the citations from this article in various online reference manager services)

Cite this article (links to download the citations from this article in formats compatible with various reference manager tools)

  1. Rafael Soares Godoy
  2. Nicholas D Cober
  3. David P Cook
  4. Emma McCourt
  5. Yupu Deng
  6. Liyuan Wang
  7. Kenny Schlosser
  8. Katelynn Rowe
  9. Duncan J Stewart
(2023)
Single cell transcriptomic atlas of lung microvascular regeneration after targeted endothelial cell ablation
eLife 12:e80900.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.80900

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.80900

Further reading

    1. Cell Biology
    Ryan M Finnerty, Daniel J Carulli ... Wipawee Winuthayanon
    Research Article

    The oviduct is the site of fertilization and preimplantation embryo development in mammals. Evidence suggests that gametes alter oviductal gene expression. To delineate the adaptive interactions between the oviduct and gamete/embryo, we performed a multi-omics characterization of oviductal tissues utilizing bulk RNA-sequencing (RNA-seq), single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq), and proteomics collected from distal and proximal at various stages after mating in mice. We observed robust region-specific transcriptional signatures. Specifically, the presence of sperm induces genes involved in pro-inflammatory responses in the proximal region at 0.5 days post-coitus (dpc). Genes involved in inflammatory responses were produced specifically by secretory epithelial cells in the oviduct. At 1.5 and 2.5 dpc, genes involved in pyruvate and glycolysis were enriched in the proximal region, potentially providing metabolic support for developing embryos. Abundant proteins in the oviductal fluid were differentially observed between naturally fertilized and superovulated samples. RNA-seq data were used to identify transcription factors predicted to influence protein abundance in the proteomic data via a novel machine learning model based on transformers of integrating transcriptomics and proteomics data. The transformers identified influential transcription factors and correlated predictive protein expressions in alignment with the in vivo-derived data. Lastly, we found some differences between inflammatory responses in sperm-exposed mouse oviducts compared to hydrosalpinx Fallopian tubes from patients. In conclusion, our multi-omics characterization and subsequent in vivo confirmation of proteins/RNAs indicate that the oviduct is adaptive and responsive to the presence of sperm and embryos in a spatiotemporal manner.

    1. Cell Biology
    Hyunggu Hahn, Carole Daly ... Alex RB Thomsen
    Research Article

    Chemokine receptors are GPCRs that regulate the chemotactic migration of a wide variety of cells including immune and cancer cells. Most chemokine receptors contain features associated with the ability to stimulate G protein signaling during β-arrestin-mediated receptor internalization into endosomes. As endosomal signaling of certain non-GPCR receptors plays a major role in cell migration, we chose to investigate the potential role of endosomal chemokine receptor signaling on mechanisms governing this function. Applying a combination of pharmacological and cell biological approaches, we demonstrate that the model chemokine receptor CCR7 recruits G protein and β-arrestin simultaneously upon chemokine stimulation, which enables internalized receptors to activate G protein from endosomes. Furthermore, spatiotemporal-resolved APEX2 proteome profiling shows that endosomal CCR7 uniquely enriches specific Rho GTPase regulators as compared to plasma membrane CCR7, which is directly associated with enhanced activity of the Rho GTPase Rac1 and chemotaxis of immune T cells. As Rac1 drives the formation of membrane protrusions during chemotaxis, our findings suggest an important integrated function of endosomal chemokine receptor signaling in cell migration.