Profiling the bloodstream form and procyclic form Trypanosoma brucei cell cycle using single cell transcriptomics
Abstract
African trypanosomes proliferate as bloodstream forms and procyclic forms in the mammal and tsetse fly midgut, respectively. This allows them to colonise the host environment upon infection and ensure life cycle progression. Yet, understanding of the mechanisms that regulate and drive the cell replication cycle of these forms is limited. Using single cell transcriptomics on unsynchronised cell populations, we have obtained high resolution cell cycle regulated transcriptomes of both procyclic and slender bloodstream form Trypanosoma brucei without prior cell sorting or synchronisation. Additionally, we describe an efficient freeze-thawing protocol that allows single cell transcriptomic analysis of cryopreserved T. brucei. Computational reconstruction of the cell cycle using periodic pseudotime inference allowed the dynamic expression patterns of cycling genes to be profiled for both life cycle forms. Comparative analyses identify a core cycling transcriptome highly conserved between forms, as well as several genes where transcript levels dynamics are form-specific. Comparing transcript expression patterns with protein abundance revealed that the majority of genes with periodic cycling transcript and protein levels exhibit a relative delay between peak transcript and protein expression. This work reveals novel detail of the cell cycle regulated transcriptomes of both forms, which are available for further interrogation via an interactive webtool.
Data availability
The transcriptome data generated in this study have been deposited in the EuropeanNucleotide Archive with project accession number PRJEB58781. The processed transcript count data and cell metadata generated in this study are available at Zenodo (10.5281/zenodo.7508131). BSF and PCF cell cycle transcriptomes can also explored using the interactive cell atlas (https://cellatlas-cxg.mvls.gla.ac.uk/Tbrucei.cellcycle.bsf/ and https://cellatlas-cxg.mvls.gla.ac.uk/Tbrucei.cellcycle.pcf/).
Article and author information
Author details
Funding
Wellcome Trust (218648/Z/19/Z)
- Emma M Briggs
Wellcome Trust (104111/Z/14/ZR)
- Thomas D Otto
Wellcome Trust (221717/Z/20/Z)
- Keith R Matthews
Wellcome Trust (220058/Z/19/Z)
- Guy R Oldrieve
- Keith R Matthews
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BB/R017166/1)
- Catarina A Marques
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BB/W001101/1)
- Catarina A Marques
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Reviewing Editor
- Malcolm J McConville, The University of Melbourne, Australia
Publication history
- Preprint posted: January 9, 2023 (view preprint)
- Received: January 20, 2023
- Accepted: May 10, 2023
- Accepted Manuscript published: May 11, 2023 (version 1)
- Version of Record published: May 25, 2023 (version 2)
Copyright
© 2023, Briggs 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
-
- 316
- Page views
-
- 95
- Downloads
-
- 0
- Citations
Article citation count generated by polling the highest count across the following sources: Crossref, PubMed Central, Scopus.
Download links
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)
Further reading
-
- Cell Biology
Matrix remodeling is a salient feature of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). Targeting cells driving matrix remodeling could be a promising avenue for IPF treatment. Analysis of transcriptomic database identified the mesenchymal transcription factor PRRX1 as upregulated in IPF. PRRX1, strongly expressed by lung fibroblasts, was regulated by a TGF-b/PGE2 balance in vitro in control and IPF human lung fibroblasts, while IPF fibroblast-derived matrix increased PRRX1 expression in a PDGFR dependent manner in control ones. PRRX1 inhibition decreased human lung fibroblast proliferation by downregulating the expression of S phase cyclins. PRRX1 inhibition also impacted TGF-β driven myofibroblastic differentiation by inhibiting SMAD2/3 phosphorylation through phosphatase PPM1A upregulation and TGFBR2 downregulation, leading to TGF-β response global decrease. Finally, targeted inhibition of Prrx1 attenuated fibrotic remodeling in vivo with intra-tracheal antisense oligonucleotides in bleomycin mouse model of lung fibrosis and ex vivo using human and mouse precision-cut lung slices. Our results identified PRRX1 as a key mesenchymal transcription factor during lung fibrogenesis.
-
- Cell Biology
- Neuroscience
Mitochondria influence cellular function through both cell-autonomous and non-cell autonomous mechanisms, such as production of paracrine and endocrine factors. Here, we demonstrate that mitochondrial regulation of the secretome is more extensive than previously appreciated, as both genetic and pharmacological disruption of the electron transport chain caused upregulation of the Alzheimer’s disease risk factor apolipoprotein E (APOE) and other secretome components. Indirect disruption of the electron transport chain by gene editing of SLC25A mitochondrial membrane transporters as well as direct genetic and pharmacological disruption of either complexes I, III, or the copper-containing complex IV of the electron transport chain elicited upregulation of APOE transcript, protein, and secretion, up to 49-fold. These APOE phenotypes were robustly expressed in diverse cell types and iPSC-derived human astrocytes as part of an inflammatory gene expression program. Moreover, age- and genotype-dependent decline in brain levels of respiratory complex I preceded an increase in APOE in the 5xFAD mouse model. We propose that mitochondria act as novel upstream regulators of APOE-dependent cellular processes in health and disease.