New Insights into Lymphocyte Development Enabled by Single-Cell Multi-Omics Tech

Researchers from Walter and Eliza Hall Institute have used single-cell multi-omics technology to discover a previously unknown ancestor of T and B lymphocytes. The team honed in on multiple aspects of single developing immune cells to define which cells would only give rise to T and B lymphocytes. Specifically, according to a paper published in Nature Immunology today, they found that all immune cells develop from a common ancestral blood stem cell, but different types of immune cells develop via different immature precursor cells.

Our immune system comprises many different types of cells with different functions, but all immune cells are derived from blood stem cells. The development of different immune cell types occurs through a branching 'family tree' of immature cells. At earlier stages of immune cell development, individual cells can give rise to several different types of mature cell, but as development progresses, cells become more limited in which final mature cells they can produce.

T and B lymphocytes have been studied for decades but by providing significantly more detail than is possible by just looking at one data set, multi-omics technologies are providing new insights, explained research leader Shalin Naik.

The team’s single cell multi-omics platform is now available to all researchers within the Single Cell Open Research Endeavour (SCORE) established by Dr Naik and co-author Daniela Zalcenstein.

Dr Zalcenstein said the research was an excellent example of the power of single cell multi-omics. "Lymphocyte development has been studied in great depth for at least four decades. Even so, by applying this new approach we were able to learn more about it. This was one of the first projects tackled by SCORE, and since then we have applied the same approaches to more than 100 different research questions. It's a really exciting new field to be part of," she said.