The repository contains processing and analysis scripts of all datasets associated with the manuscript "Spatiotemporal signaling underlies progressive vascular rarefaction in myocardial infarction" by Tung et al., 2023.
Processed datasets can be probed on Integrated Single-cell Navigation Portal (ISNAP), a modular bioinformatics platform for publishing biological data that is compatible with numerous R workflows, using this link.
Therapeutic angiogenesis represents a promising avenue to revascularize the ischemic heart. Its limited success is partly due to our poor understanding of the cardiac stroma, specifically mural cells, and their response to ischemic injury. Here, we combine single-cell and positional transcriptomics to assess the behaviour of mural cells within the healing heart. In response to myocardial infarction, mural cells adopt an altered state closely associated with the infarct and retain a distinct lineage from fibroblasts. This response is concurrent with vascular rarefaction and reduced coverage by mural cells. Positional transcriptomics reveal that the infarcted heart is governed by regional-dependent and temporally regulated programs. While the remote zone acts as an important source of pro-angiogenic signals, the infarct zone is accentuated by chronic activation of anti-angiogenic, pro-fibrotic, and inflammatory cues. Together, our work unveils the spatiotemporal programs underlying cardiac repair and establishes an association between vascular deterioration and mural cell dysfunction.
Raw data (fastqs) and aligned gene count matrices are deposited in NCBI GEO GSE206787