Gene expression profile of single-cell level alterations in hippocampal tissue in a rat model of radiation-induced cognitive dysfunction

Radiotherapy is an important therapeutic option for the treatment of primary and metastatic brain tumors, and there is increasing concern about the side effects associated with it as survival time after treatment increases. By far, cognitive dysfunction is the most common radiation-induced central nervous system injury. Studies have shown that the hippocampus is involved in radiation-induced cognitive dysfunction. We constructed a model of radiation-induced cognitive dysfunction by irradiating the whole brain of one-month-old rats with 20 Gy, and analyzed the expression profiles in the hippocampus of rats with radiation-induced cognitive dysfunction using single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq). Overall design: The hippocampus of rats was dissected two months after whole-brain 20Gy irradiation. A total of six samples were analyzed by scRNA sequencing, three in the control group and three in the irradiated group.