Spatial patterns of gene expression are unveiled in the chick primitive streak by ordering single-cell transcriptomes.
Katie L Vermillion, Rhonda Bacher, Alex P Tannenbaum, Scott Swanson, Peng Jiang, Li-Fang Chu, Ron Stewart, James A Thomson, David T Vereide
Author Information
Katie L Vermillion: Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI 53715, USA.
Rhonda Bacher: Department of Biostatistics, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA.
Alex P Tannenbaum: Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI 53715, USA.
Scott Swanson: Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI 53715, USA.
Peng Jiang: Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI 53715, USA.
Li-Fang Chu: Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI 53715, USA.
Ron Stewart: Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI 53715, USA.
James A Thomson: Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI 53715, USA; Department of Cell&Regenerative Biology, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI 53706, USA; Department of Molecular, Cellular,&Developmental Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA.
David T Vereide: Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, WI 53715, USA. Electronic address: dvereide@morgridge.org.
During vertebrate development, progenitor cells give rise to tissues and organs through a complex choreography that commences at gastrulation. A hallmark event of gastrulation is the formation of the primitive streak, a linear assembly of cells along the anterior-posterior (AP) axis of the developing organism. To examine the primitive streak at a single-cell resolution, we measured the transcriptomes of individual chick cells from the streak or the surrounding tissue (the rest of the area pellucida) in Hamburger-Hamilton stage 4 embryos. The single-cell transcriptomes were then ordered by the statistical method Wave-Crest to deduce both the relative position along the AP axis and the prospective lineage of single cells. The ordered transcriptomes reveal intricate patterns of gene expression along the primitive streak.
