SOX9 switch links regeneration to fibrosis at the single-cell level in mammalian kidneys.
Shikhar AggarwalZhanxiang WangDavid Rincon Fernandez PachecoAnna RinaldiAlex C RajewskiJasper CallemeynElisabet Van LoonBaptiste LamarthéeAmbart Ester CovarrubiasJean HouMichifumi YamashitaHaruhiko AkiyamaS Ananth KarumanchiClive N SvendsenPaul W NobleStanley C JordanJoshua J BreunigMaarten NaesensPietro E CippàSanjeev KumarPublished in: Science (New York, N.Y.) (2024)
The steps governing healing with or without fibrosis within the same microenvironment are unclear. After acute kidney injury (AKI), injured proximal tubular epithelial cells activate SOX9 for self-restoration. Using a multimodal approach for a head-to-head comparison of injury-induced SOX9 lineages, we identified a dynamic SOX9 switch in repairing epithelia. Lineages that regenerated epithelia silenced SOX9 and healed without fibrosis (SOX9 on-off ). By contrast, lineages with unrestored apicobasal polarity maintained SOX9 activity in sustained efforts to regenerate, which were identified as a SOX9 on-on Cadherin6 pos cell state. These reprogrammed cells generated substantial single-cell WNT activity to provoke a fibroproliferative response in adjacent fibroblasts, driving AKI to chronic kidney disease. Transplanted human kidneys displayed similar SOX9/CDH6/WNT2B responses. Thus, we have uncovered a sensor of epithelial repair status, the activity of which determines regeneration with or without fibrosis.
Keyphrases
- stem cells
- transcription factor
- acute kidney injury
- single cell
- chronic kidney disease
- cell therapy
- rna seq
- endothelial cells
- induced apoptosis
- magnetic resonance imaging
- magnetic resonance
- cardiac surgery
- mesenchymal stem cells
- signaling pathway
- end stage renal disease
- liver fibrosis
- oxidative stress
- extracellular matrix
- peritoneal dialysis
- wound healing
- cell death