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The ACE2 expression of maternal-fetal interface and fetal organs indicates potential risk of vertical transmission of SARS-COV-2

Mengmeng Li, Liang Chen, Chenglong Xiong, View ORCID ProfileXiangjie Li
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.02.27.967760
Mengmeng Li
1Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Peking Union Medical College, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences
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Liang Chen
2State Key Laboratory of Cardiovascular Disease, Fuwai Hospital, National Center for Cardiovascular Diseases, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China
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Chenglong Xiong
3Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, Fudan University, Shanghai, China
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  • For correspondence: ele717@163.com
Xiangjie Li
2State Key Laboratory of Cardiovascular Disease, Fuwai Hospital, National Center for Cardiovascular Diseases, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China
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  • ORCID record for Xiangjie Li
  • For correspondence: ele717@163.com
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Abstract

The new type of pneumonia caused by the SARS-CoV-2 (Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) has been declared as a global public health concern by WHO. Thousands of human infections have been diagnosed in China along with many other countries, which exhibited apparent person-to-person transmission characteristics of this virus. The capacity of vertical transmission in SARS-CoV-2 remains controversial recently. Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) is now confirmed as the receptor of SARS-CoV-2 and plays essential roles in human infection and transmission. In present study, we collected the online available single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) data to evaluate the cell specific expression of ACE2 in maternal-fetal interface as well as in multiple fetal organs. Our results revealed that ACE2 was highly expressed in maternal-fetal interface cells including stromal cells and perivascular cells of decidua, and cytotrophoblast and syncytiotrophoblast in placenta. Meanwhile, ACE2 was also expressed in specific cell types of human fetal heart, liver and lung, but not in kidney. And in a study containing series fetal and post-natal mouse lung, we observed ACE2 was dynamically changed over the time, and ACE2 was extremely high in neonatal mice at post-natal day 1∼3. In summary, this study revealed that the SARS-CoV-2 receptor ACE2 was widely spread in specific cell types of maternal-fetal interface and fetal organs, suggesting the potential capacity for the infection of SARS-CoV-2 to the fetus through the vertical transmission.

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The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.
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Posted February 27, 2020.
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The ACE2 expression of maternal-fetal interface and fetal organs indicates potential risk of vertical transmission of SARS-COV-2
Mengmeng Li, Liang Chen, Chenglong Xiong, Xiangjie Li
bioRxiv 2020.02.27.967760; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.02.27.967760
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The ACE2 expression of maternal-fetal interface and fetal organs indicates potential risk of vertical transmission of SARS-COV-2
Mengmeng Li, Liang Chen, Chenglong Xiong, Xiangjie Li
bioRxiv 2020.02.27.967760; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.02.27.967760

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