High Resolution Spatial Mapping of Microbiome-Host Interactions via in situ Polyadenylation and Spatial RNA Sequencing

Inter-microbial and host–microbial interactions are thought to be critical for the functioning of the gut microbiome, but few substantive tools are available to measure these interactions. Here, we report a method for unbiased spatial sampling of microbiome-host interactions in the gut at high spatial resolution. This method combines enzymatic in situ polyadenylation of both bacterial and host transcripts with spatial RNA-sequencing. Application of this method revealed the biogeography of the mouse gut microbiome as function of location in the intestine, short-range intermicrobial interaction, local shaping of the microbiome by the host, and tumor-associated changes in the architecture of the host-microbiome interface. This method is compatible with broadly available commercial platforms for spatial RNA-sequencing, and can therefore be readily adopted to broadly study the role of short-range, bidirectional host-microbe interactions in microbiome health and disease. Overall design: Spatial transcriptomics