RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Expression of <em>ACE2</em>, the SARS-CoV-2 receptor, and <em>TMPRSS2</em> in prostate epithelial cells
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2020.04.24.056259
DO 10.1101/2020.04.24.056259
A1 Hanbing Song
A1 Bobak Seddighzadeh
A1 Matthew R. Cooperberg
A1 Franklin W. Huang
YR 2020
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/04/25/2020.04.24.056259.1.abstract
AB The COVID-19 pandemic has spread across more than 200 countries and resulted in over 170,000 deaths. For unclear reasons, higher mortality rates from COVID-19 have been reported in men compared to women. While the SARS-CoV-2 receptor ACE2 and serine protease TMPRSS2 have been detected in lung and other tissues, it is not clear what sex differences may exist. We analyzed a publicly-available normal human prostate single-cell RNA sequencing dataset and found TMPRSS2 and ACE2 co-expressing cells in epithelial cells, with a higher proportion in club and hillock cells. Then we investigated datasets of lung epithelial cells and also found club cells co-expressing TMPRSS2 and ACE2. A comparison of ACE2 expression in lung tissue between males and females showed higher expression in males and a larger proportion of ACE2+ cells in male type II pneumocytes, with preliminary evidence that type II pneumocytes of all lung epithelial cell types showed the highest expression of ACE2. These results raise the possibility that sex differences in ACE2 expression and the presence of double-positive cells in the prostate may contribute to the observed disparities of COVID-19.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.