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Maenhoudt N, De Moor A, Vankelecom H. Modeling Endometrium Biology and Disease. J Pers Med 2022; 12:1048. [PMID: 35887546 PMCID: PMC9316888 DOI: 10.3390/jpm12071048] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/06/2022] [Revised: 06/22/2022] [Accepted: 06/24/2022] [Indexed: 12/11/2022] Open
Abstract
The endometrium, lining the uterine lumen, is highly essential for human reproduction. Its exceptional remodeling plasticity, including the transformation process to welcome and nest the embryo, is not well understood. Lack of representative and reliable study models allowing the molecular and cellular mechanisms underlying endometrium development and biology to be deciphered is an important hurdle to progress in the field. Recently, powerful organoid models have been developed that not only recapitulate endometrial biology such as the menstrual cycle, but also faithfully reproduce diseases of the endometrium such as endometriosis. Moreover, single-cell profiling endeavors of the endometrium in health and disease, and of derived organoids, start to provide deeper insight into cellular complexity and expression specificities, and in resulting tissue processes. This granular portrayal will not only help in understanding endometrium biology and disease, but also in pinning down the tissue's stem cells, at present not yet conclusively defined. Here, we provide a general overview of endometrium development and biology, and the efforts of modeling both the healthy tissue, as well as its key diseased form of endometriosis. The future of modeling and deciphering this key tissue, hidden inside the womb, looks bright.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | - Hugo Vankelecom
- Unit of Stem Cell Research, Cluster of Stem Cell and Developmental Biology, Department of Development and Regeneration, Leuven Stem Cell Institute, 3000 Leuven, Belgium; (N.M.); (A.D.M.)
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Zhang X, Li Y, Chen X, Jin B, Shu C, Ni W, Jiang Y, Zhang J, Ma L, Shu J. Single-cell transcriptome analysis uncovers the molecular and cellular characteristics of thin endometrium. FASEB J 2022; 36:e22193. [PMID: 35201635 DOI: 10.1096/fj.202101579r] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/12/2021] [Revised: 01/04/2022] [Accepted: 01/18/2022] [Indexed: 12/11/2022]
Abstract
Infertility is a social and medical problem around the world and the incidence continues to rise. Thin endometrium (TE) is a great challenge of infertility treatment, even by in vitro fertilization and embryo transfer. It is widely believed that TE impairs endometrium receptivity. However, only a few studies have explained the molecular mechanism. Herein, in order to reveal the possible mechanism, we sampled endometrium from a TE patient and a control volunteer and got a transcriptomic atlas of 18 775 individual cells which was constructed using single-cell RNA sequencing, and seven cell types have been identified. The cells were acquired during proliferative and secretory phases, respectively. The proportion of epithelial cells and stromal cells showed a significant difference between the TE group and the control group. In addition, differential expressed genes (DEGs) in diverse cell types were revealed, the enriched pathways of DEGs were found closely related to the protein synthesis in TE of both proliferative and secretory phases. Some DEGs can influence cell-type ratio and impaired endometrial receptivity in TE. Furthermore, divergent expression of estrogen receptors 1 and progesterone receptors in stromal and epithelial cells were compared in the TE sample from the control. The cellular and molecular heterogeneity found in this study provided valuable information for disclosing the mechanisms of impaired receptivity in TE.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xirong Zhang
- Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Qingdao Medical College of Qingdao University, Qingdao, China.,Center for Reproductive Medicine, Department of Reproductive Endocrinology, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China
| | - Yini Li
- School of Life Sciences, Westlake University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Xiaopan Chen
- Center for Reproductive Medicine, Department of Reproductive Endocrinology, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China.,Department of Genetic and Genomic Medicine, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital, (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China
| | - Bihui Jin
- Center for Reproductive Medicine, Department of Reproductive Endocrinology, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China
| | - Chongyi Shu
- Center for Reproductive Medicine, Department of Reproductive Endocrinology, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China
| | - Wanmao Ni
- Cancer Center, Key Laboratory of Tumor Molecular Diagnosis and Individualized Medicine of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China
| | - Yinshen Jiang
- Center for Reproductive Medicine, Department of Reproductive Endocrinology, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China
| | - Jing Zhang
- Center for Reproductive Medicine, Department of Reproductive Endocrinology, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China.,Department of Obstetrics, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital, (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China
| | - Lijia Ma
- School of Life Sciences, Westlake University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Jing Shu
- Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Qingdao Medical College of Qingdao University, Qingdao, China.,Center for Reproductive Medicine, Department of Reproductive Endocrinology, Zhejiang Provincial People's Hospital (Affiliated People's Hospital, Hangzhou Medical College), Hangzhou, China
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Cheung VC, Peng CY, Marinić M, Sakabe NJ, Aneas I, Lynch VJ, Ober C, Nobrega MA, Kessler JA. Pluripotent stem cell-derived endometrial stromal fibroblasts in a cyclic, hormone-responsive, coculture model of human decidua. Cell Rep 2021; 35:109138. [PMID: 34010658 DOI: 10.1016/j.celrep.2021.109138] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/18/2020] [Revised: 01/22/2021] [Accepted: 04/26/2021] [Indexed: 12/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Various human diseases and pregnancy-related disorders reflect endometrial dysfunction. However, rodent models do not share fundamental biological processes with the human endometrium, such as spontaneous decidualization, and no existing human cell cultures recapitulate the cyclic interactions between endometrial stromal and epithelial compartments necessary for decidualization and implantation. Here we report a protocol differentiating human pluripotent stem cells into endometrial stromal fibroblasts (PSC-ESFs) that are highly pure and able to decidualize. Coculture of PSC-ESFs with placenta-derived endometrial epithelial cells generated organoids used to examine stromal-epithelial interactions. Cocultures exhibited specific endometrial markers in the appropriate compartments, organization with cell polarity, and hormone responsiveness of both cell types. Furthermore, cocultures recapitulate a central feature of the human decidua by cyclically responding to hormone withdrawal followed by hormone retreatment. This advance enables mechanistic studies of the cyclic responses that characterize the human endometrium.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Chian-Yu Peng
- Department of Neurology, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
| | - Mirna Marinić
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA; Current address: Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Noboru J Sakabe
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Ivy Aneas
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Vincent J Lynch
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA; Department of Biological Sciences, University of Buffalo, Buffalo, NY, USA
| | - Carole Ober
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Marcelo A Nobrega
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - John A Kessler
- Department of Neurology, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL 60611, USA.
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Cochrane DR, Campbell KR, Greening K, Ho GC, Hopkins J, Bui M, Douglas JM, Sharlandjieva V, Munzur AD, Lai D, DeGrood M, Gibbard EW, Leung S, Boyd N, Cheng AS, Chow C, Lim JL, Farnell DA, Kommoss S, Kommoss F, Roth A, Hoang L, McAlpine JN, Shah SP, Huntsman DG. Single cell transcriptomes of normal endometrial derived organoids uncover novel cell type markers and cryptic differentiation of primary tumours. J Pathol 2020; 252:201-214. [PMID: 32686114 DOI: 10.1002/path.5511] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/12/2020] [Revised: 06/11/2020] [Accepted: 07/14/2020] [Indexed: 01/04/2023]
Abstract
Endometrial carcinoma, the most common gynaecological cancer, develops from endometrial epithelium which is composed of secretory and ciliated cells. Pathologic classification is unreliable and there is a need for prognostic tools. We used single cell sequencing to study organoid model systems derived from normal endometrial endometrium to discover novel markers specific for endometrial ciliated or secretory cells. A marker of secretory cells (MPST) and several markers of ciliated cells (FAM92B, WDR16, and DYDC2) were validated by immunohistochemistry on organoids and tissue sections. We performed single cell sequencing on endometrial and ovarian tumours and found both secretory-like and ciliated-like tumour cells. We found that ciliated cell markers (DYDC2, CTH, FOXJ1, and p73) and the secretory cell marker MPST were expressed in endometrial tumours and positively correlated with disease-specific and overall survival of endometrial cancer patients. These findings suggest that expression of differentiation markers in tumours correlates with less aggressive disease, as would be expected for tumours that retain differentiation capacity, albeit cryptic in the case of ciliated cells. These markers could be used to improve the risk stratification of endometrial cancer patients, thereby improving their management. We further assessed whether consideration of MPST expression could refine the ProMiSE molecular classification system for endometrial tumours. We found that higher expression levels of MPST could be used to refine stratification of three of the four ProMiSE molecular subgroups, and that any level of MPST expression was able to significantly refine risk stratification of the copy number high subgroup which has the worst prognosis. Taken together, this shows that single cell sequencing of putative cells of origin has the potential to uncover novel biomarkers that could be used to guide management of cancers. © 2020 Pathological Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dawn R Cochrane
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Kieran R Campbell
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Kendall Greening
- Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Germain C Ho
- Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - James Hopkins
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Minh Bui
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - J Maxwell Douglas
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | | | - Aslı D Munzur
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Daniel Lai
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Maya DeGrood
- Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Evan W Gibbard
- Department of Medical Genetics, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Samuel Leung
- Genetic Pathology Evaluation Centre, Vancouver General Hospital, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Niki Boyd
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Angela S Cheng
- Genetic Pathology Evaluation Centre, Vancouver General Hospital, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Christine Chow
- Genetic Pathology Evaluation Centre, Vancouver General Hospital, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Jamie Lp Lim
- Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York City, NY, USA
| | - David A Farnell
- Department of Anatomical Pathology, Vancouver General Hospital, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Stefan Kommoss
- Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
| | - Friedrich Kommoss
- Institute of Pathology, Medizin Campus Bodensee, Friedrichshafen, Germany
| | - Andrew Roth
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Lien Hoang
- Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Jessica N McAlpine
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
| | - Sohrab P Shah
- Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York City, NY, USA
| | - David G Huntsman
- Department of Molecular Oncology, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, BC, Canada.,Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada.,Department of Medical Genetics, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
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