A Molecular Atlas of Cell Types and Zonation in the Brain Vasculature

Overview

Journal Nature

Specialty Science

Date 2018 Feb 15

PMID 29443965

Citations 942

Authors

Michael Vanlandewijck

Liqun He

Maarja Andaloussi Mae

Johanna Andrae

Koji Ando

Francesca Del Gaudio

Khayrun Nahar

Thibaud Lebouvier

Barbara Lavina

Leonor Gouveia

Ying Sun

Elisabeth Raschperger

Markus Rasanen

Yvette Zarb

Naoki Mochizuki

Annika Keller

Urban Lendahl

Christer Betsholtz

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Cerebrovascular disease is the third most common cause of death in developed countries, but our understanding of the cells that compose the cerebral vasculature is limited. Here, using vascular single-cell transcriptomics, we provide molecular definitions for the principal types of blood vascular and vessel-associated cells in the adult mouse brain. We uncover the transcriptional basis of the gradual phenotypic change (zonation) along the arteriovenous axis and reveal unexpected cell type differences: a seamless continuum for endothelial cells versus a punctuated continuum for mural cells. We also provide insight into pericyte organotypicity and define a population of perivascular fibroblast-like cells that are present on all vessel types except capillaries. Our work illustrates the power of single-cell transcriptomics to decode the higher organizational principles of a tissue and may provide the initial chapter in a molecular encyclopaedia of the mammalian vasculature.

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