Single-cell profiling of the developing embryonic heart in Drosophila

• DOI: 10.1242/dev.201936
• Publication Date: 2023-08-01T14:13:43Z
• Authors: Xiaohu Huang; Yulong Fu; Hangnoh Lee; Yunpo Zhao; Wendy Yang; Joyce van de Leemput; Zhe Han
• Keywords: Embryonic heart; Heart development; Cell type

Drosophila is an important model for studying heart development and disease. Yet, single-cell transcriptomic data of its developing have not been performed. Here, we report profiling the entire fly using ∼3000 Hand-GFP embryos collected at five consecutive developmental stages, ranging from bilateral migrating rows cardiac progenitors to a fused tube. The revealed six distinct cell types in embryonic heart: cardioblasts, both Svp+ Tin+ subtypes; pericardial (PC) that can be distinguished by four key transcription factors (Eve, Odd, Ct Tin) include newly described end line PC. Notably, combines transcriptional signatures mammalian first second fields. Using unique markers each type, defined their number location during build comprehensive 3D map. These provide resource track expression any gene heart, which serve as reference study genetic perturbations diseases.