Single-cell RNA-seq of NR5A1-eGFP positive cells of the developing mouse testis from E10.5 to E16.5. Mus musculus

Purpose: We performed a time-course single-cell RNA-seq of the somatic cells of the XY mouse gonads to study the cell population heterogeneity and the genetic program during their differentiation. Methods: We collected gonads from NR5A1-eGFP transgenic embryos at five embryonic stages: E10.5, E11.5, E12.5, E13.5, E16.5. Cells were captured with the C1 autoprep system and cDNA sequenced with Illumina HiSeq 2000. Results: One cell population was detected at E10.5 and gives rise to both Sertoli and fetal Leydig cells. A precursor cell population remains undifferentiated at E16.5 and are likely to be adult Leydig cell precursors. Conclusion: Our study is, to date, the most granular transcriptomic study of the developing mouse testis and provide a more complete model of somatic cell differentiation during male sex determination. Overall design: 435 cells were collected in total. 64 cells at E10.5, 98 cells at E11.5, 76 cells at E12.5, 120 cells at E13.5, 77 cells at E16.5. We performed two independent captures for each embryonic stage to reach a reasonable number of cells except for E10.5 where we captured enough cells in one experiment.