Single-cell RNASeq analysis of human retinal organoids generated from hiPSC derived of a healthy donor patient

Results: Our histologic studies indicated that human retinal organoids (HROs) at day 200 of differentiation in this system are postmitotic and thus completed retinogenesis. Further, HRO contain all major retinal cell types in a laminated structure. Notably, HROs are cone photoreceptor-rich, show a 1:1:1 ratio of Müller glia, rod and cone photoreceptor. Immunostaining and ultrastructural studies showed that photoreceptors neurons mature, including photoreceptor inner and nascent outer segment formation. Our transcriptome analysis at the single cell level supports these findings. Further, comparison with published datasets (Voigt et al. 2019 [PMID: 31075224]) indicate that the genotype of cone photoreceptors in this HRO system correlates more strongly with the foveal cones of the human primary retina than peripheral cones. Müller glia show a trend towards human fovea whereas rod photoreceptors were found to be nearly similar. Conclusions: Single cell transcriptome analysis of HROs support and extend our findings at the histological level, indicating that HROs are cone photoreceptor-rich, and provide some characteristics of the human macula. Dissociated cells (n = 6665) of one human retinal organoid.