Single-cell transcriptome profiles of wild-type and IRF8KO microglia

IRF8 is a transcription factor that is crucial in determining the lineage of microglia. We previously showed that IRF8 is robustly bound during the early postnatal period. To better understand IRF8's postnatal functions, we analyzed mice in which IRF8 was removed after P16. By using single-cell nuclei sequencing, we analyzed cells in which IRF8 was definitely knocked out and investigated both the transcriptome and chromatin accessibility that IRF8 regulates. The differential analysis showed the importance of IRF8 in regulating postnatal transcriptional programs and epigenetic landscapes that are related to microglial identity and disease-associated genes. This study provides a new perspective on how IRF8-mediated transcriptional programs affect microglia. Transcriptome profiles and chromatin landscapes of adult WT and IRF8 conditional knockout (IRF8cKO) microglia were analyzed simultaneously at a single-cell level using 10xGenomics.