SARS‐CoV‐2 receptor ACE2 and TMPRSS2 are primarily expressed in bronchial transient secretory cells

• Soeren Lukassen ^[2] ; Robert Lorenz Chua ^[2] ; Timo Trefzer ^[2] ; Nicolas C Kahn ^[3] ; Marc A Schneider ^[4] ; Thomas Muley ^[4] ; Hauke Winter ^[5] ; Michael Meister ^[4] ; Carmen Veith ^[1] ; Agnes W Boots ^[6] ; Bianca P Hennig ^[2] ; Michael Kreuter ^[7] ; Christian Conrad ^[8] ; Roland Eils ^[9]
  1. [1] German Cancer Research Center

     German Cancer Research Center

     Stadtkreis Heidelberg, Alemania

     
  2. [2] 1 Charité ‐ Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt‐Universität zu Berlin, and Berlin Institute of Health Berlin Germany; 2 Center for Digital Health Berlin Institute of Health (BIH) Berlin Germany
  3. [3] 3 Department of Pneumology and Respiratory Critical Care Medicine Center for interstitial and rare lung diseases Thoraxklinik, Heidelberg University Hospital Heidelberg Germany; 4 Translational Lung Research Center Heidelberg (TLRC) Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL) Heidelberg Germany
  4. [4] 4 Translational Lung Research Center Heidelberg (TLRC) Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL) Heidelberg Germany; 5 Translational Research Unit Thoraxklinik, Heidelberg University Hospital Heidelberg Germany
  5. [5] 4 Translational Lung Research Center Heidelberg (TLRC) Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL) Heidelberg Germany; 6 Department of Thoracic Surgery Thoraxklinik, Heidelberg University Hospital Heidelberg Germany
  6. [6] 8 Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology NUTRIM School of Nutrition Translational Research and Metabolism Maastricht University Maastricht the Netherlands
  7. [7] 3 Department of Pneumology and Respiratory Critical Care Medicine Center for interstitial and rare lung diseases Thoraxklinik, Heidelberg University Hospital Heidelberg Germany
  8. [8] 1 Charité ‐ Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt‐Universität zu Berlin, and Berlin Institute of Health Berlin Germany
  9. [9] 1 Charité ‐ Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt‐Universität zu Berlin, and Berlin Institute of Health Berlin Germany; 2 Center for Digital Health Berlin Institute of Health (BIH) Berlin Germany; 9 Health Data Science Unit Heidelberg University Hospital and BioQuant Heidelberg Germany

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• Localización: EMBO journal: European Molecular Biology Organization, ISSN 0261-4189, Vol. 39, Nº. 10, 2020
• Idioma: inglés
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  • The SARS‐CoV‐2 pandemic affecting the human respiratory system severely challenges public health and urgently demands for increasing our understanding of COVID‐19 pathogenesis, especially host factors facilitating virus infection and replication. SARS‐CoV‐2 was reported to enter cells via binding to ACE2, followed by its priming by TMPRSS2. Here, we investigate ACE2 and TMPRSS2 expression levels and their distribution across cell types in lung tissue (twelve donors, 39,778 cells) and in cells derived from subsegmental bronchial branches (four donors, 17,521 cells) by single nuclei and single cell RNA sequencing, respectively. While TMPRSS2 is strongly expressed in both tissues, in the subsegmental bronchial branches ACE2 is predominantly expressed in a transient secretory cell type. Interestingly, these transiently differentiating cells show an enrichment for pathways related to RHO GTPase function and viral processes suggesting increased vulnerability for SARS‐CoV‐2 infection. Our data provide a rich resource for future investigations of COVID‐19 infection and pathogenesis.