Single-cell transcriptomics of the Drosophila wing disc reveals instructive epithelium-to-myoblast interactions
https://elifesciences.org/articles/61276
Nicholas J. Everetts * 1, 2, Melanie I. Worley * 1, Riku Yasutomi 1, Nir Yosef 2, and Iswar K. Hariharan 1 (* co-first authorship)
1 Department of Molecular and Cell Biology University of California, Berkeley
515 Life Sciences Addition Berkeley CA, 94720-3200
2 Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science, Center for Computational Biology, University of California, Berkeley
304A Stanley Hall Berkeley, CA 94720-3200
Abstract
In both vertebrates and invertebrates, generating a functional appendage requires interactions between ectoderm-derived epithelia and mesoderm-derived cells. To investigate such interactions, we used single-cell transcriptomics to generate a temporal cell atlas of the Drosophila wing disc from two developmental time points. Using these data, we visualized gene expression using a multi-layered model of the wing disc and catalogued ligand-receptor pairs that could mediate signaling between epithelial cells and adult muscle precursors (AMPs). We found that localized expression of the FGF ligands, Thisbe and Pyramus, in the disc epithelium regulates the number and location of the AMPs. In addition, Hedgehog ligand from the epithelium activates a specific transcriptional program within adjacent AMP cells, defined by AMP-specific targets Neurotactin and midline, that is critical for proper formation of direct flight muscles. More generally, our annotated temporal cell atlas provides an organ-wide view of potential cell-cell interactions between epithelial and myogenic cells.
Single cell data is avaiable on GEO: GSE155543
- Assembled three-layer reference geometry + expression patterns
- Map cells to reference with Distmap (Karaiskos et al., 2017 - https://github.com/rajewsky-lab/distmap)
and see also:
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Nicholas J. Everetts (nicholas_everetts@berkeley.edu)