Combined single-cell RNA- and ATAC-seq in fruit-eating and insect-eating bats

Frugivory, the dietary specialization of fruit, evolved multiple times in mammals, notably bats, from an ancestral insectivore. To specialize on fruit, fruit-eating bats have undergone major changes in their kidneys and pancreases. To understand the cellular and molecular underpinnings of frugivory, we performed simultaneous single-cell RNA- and ATAC-seq on adult male fruit bat (Artibeus jamaicensis) and insect bat (Eptesicus fuscus) kidneys and pancreases in fasted and fed states. Our multi-omic datasets are the first to be generated for bats, along with the first single cell datasets for bats, chromatin accessibility datasets for bats, and gene expression profilings for bat pancreas.