Single Cell RNA Sequencing Analysis of Polystyrene Microplastic Exposed and control Zebrafish Intestine

Microplastics (MPs) as widespread contamination pose high risk for aquatic organisms. However, current understanding of MP toxicities are based on cell population-averaged measurements. Here we used single-cell RNA sequencing to provide the transcriptome heterogeneity of 12000 intestinal cells obtained from zebrafishes exposed to 100nm, 5μm and 200μm polystyrene MPs (PS-MPs) for 21 days. Eight intestinal cell populations were identified. We found that all the three sizes of PS-MPs induced dysfunction of intestinal immune cells (including phagosome and regulation of immune system process). Single cell RNA sequencing were adopted to learn the transcriptional variation in zebrafish intestine followed exposure MPs with different size (100 nm, 5 μm and 200 μm).