RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Comprehensive evaluation of <em>ACE2</em> expression in female ovary by single-cell RNA-seq analysis
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2021.02.23.432460
DO 10.1101/2021.02.23.432460
A1 Siming Kong
A1 Zhiqiang Yan
A1 Peng Yuan
A1 Xixi Liu
A1 Yidong Chen
A1 Ming Yang
A1 Wei Chen
A1 Shi Song
A1 Jie Yan
A1 Liying Yan
A1 Jie Qiao
YR 2021
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/02/23/2021.02.23.432460.abstract
AB Pneumonia induced by severe acute respiratory coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) via ACE2 receptor may affect many organ systems like lung, heart and kidney. An autopsy report revealed positive SARS-Cov-2 detection results in ovary, however, the developmental-stage-specific and cell-type-specific risk in fetal primordial germ cells (PGCs) and adult women ovary remained unclear. In this study, we used single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) datasets spanning several developmental stages of ovary including PGCs and cumulus-oocyte complex (COC) to investigate the potential risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection. We found that PGCs and COC exhibited high ACE2 expression. More importantly, the ratio of ACE2-positive cells was sharply up-regulated in primary stage and ACE2 was expressed in all oocytes and cumulus cells in preovulatory stage, suggesting the possible risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection in follicular development. CatB/L, not TMPRSS2, was identified to prime for SARS-CoV-2 entry in follicle. Our findings provided insights into the potential risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection during folliculogenesis in adulthood and the possible risk in fetal PGCs.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.SARS-CoV-2severe acute respiratory coronavirus 2SARSSevere acute respiratory syndromePGCsprimordial germ cellsACE2angiotensin-converting enzyme2CatB/Lcathepsin B and LscRNA-seqsingle-cell RNA-sequencingCOCcumulus-oocyte complex.