Pseudocell Tracer-A method for inferring dynamic trajectories using scRNAseq and its application to B cells undergoing immunoglobulin class switch recombination

PLoS Comput Biol. 2021 May 3;17(5):e1008094. doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008094. eCollection 2021 May.

Abstract

Single cell RNA sequencing (scRNAseq) can be used to infer a temporal ordering of cellular states. Current methods for the inference of cellular trajectories rely on unbiased dimensionality reduction techniques. However, such biologically agnostic ordering can prove difficult for modeling complex developmental or differentiation processes. The cellular heterogeneity of dynamic biological compartments can result in sparse sampling of key intermediate cell states. To overcome these limitations, we develop a supervised machine learning framework, called Pseudocell Tracer, which infers trajectories in pseudospace rather than in pseudotime. The method uses a supervised encoder, trained with adjacent biological information, to project scRNAseq data into a low-dimensional manifold that maps the transcriptional states a cell can occupy. Then a generative adversarial network (GAN) is used to simulate pesudocells at regular intervals along a virtual cell-state axis. We demonstrate the utility of Pseudocell Tracer by modeling B cells undergoing immunoglobulin class switch recombination (CSR) during a prototypic antigen-induced antibody response. Our results revealed an ordering of key transcription factors regulating CSR to the IgG1 isotype, including the concomitant expression of Nfkb1 and Stat6 prior to the upregulation of Bach2 expression. Furthermore, the expression dynamics of genes encoding cytokine receptors suggest a poised IL-4 signaling state that preceeds CSR to the IgG1 isotype.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • B-Lymphocytes / immunology*
  • B-Lymphocytes / metabolism
  • Basic-Leucine Zipper Transcription Factors / genetics
  • Computational Biology
  • Computer Simulation
  • Databases, Nucleic Acid
  • Gene Expression
  • Immunoglobulin Class Switching / genetics*
  • Immunoglobulin G / genetics
  • Interleukin-4 / immunology
  • Mice
  • Mice, Inbred C57BL
  • Models, Immunological
  • NF-kappa B p50 Subunit / genetics
  • Neural Networks, Computer
  • RNA-Seq / methods
  • RNA-Seq / statistics & numerical data
  • Receptors, Cytokine / genetics
  • Recombination, Genetic
  • STAT6 Transcription Factor / genetics
  • Signal Transduction
  • Single-Cell Analysis / methods
  • Single-Cell Analysis / statistics & numerical data
  • Supervised Machine Learning*

Substances

  • Bach2 protein, mouse
  • Basic-Leucine Zipper Transcription Factors
  • Il4 protein, mouse
  • Immunoglobulin G
  • NF-kappa B p50 Subunit
  • Receptors, Cytokine
  • STAT6 Transcription Factor
  • Stat6 protein, mouse
  • Nfkb1 protein, mouse
  • Interleukin-4

Grants and funding

The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of NVIDIA Corporation with the donation of GPUs used for this research (AK), UPMC-ITTC initiative (HS), and National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant31970842; HX). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.