Single-cell profiling reveals transcriptional signatures, novel epithelial cells and cell-cell crosstalk in idiopathic membranous nephropathy patients

Our understanding of the pathogenesis of idiopathic membranous nephropathy is limited by an incomplete molecular characterization of the cell types in the kidney and interaction between the cells. Besides, the reason for the heterogeneity of these patients as well as the variety of clinical outcomes remains elusive. Therefore, we applied scRNA-seq to kidney biopsies of patients with IMN to identify gene expression at the single-cell level, elucidate cells involved in the progression of IMN, and uncover intercellular interactions. Overall design: We analyzed kidney samples from 6 patients with IMN and 2 healthy control subjects using single-cell RNA sequencing. We then identified distinct cell clusters through unsupervised clustering analysis of kidney specimens. Identification of the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and enrichment analysis in different cells as well as the interaction between cells were also performed. In addition, the differences of gene expression and enrichment pathway in patients with different levels of proteinuria were analyzed.