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Alsaggaf I, Buchan D, Wan C. Improving cell type identification with Gaussian noise-augmented single-cell RNA-seq contrastive learning. Brief Funct Genomics 2024; 23:441-451. [PMID: 38242863 DOI: 10.1093/bfgp/elad059] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/01/2023] [Revised: 12/14/2023] [Accepted: 12/18/2023] [Indexed: 01/21/2024] Open
Abstract
Cell type identification is an important task for single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) data analysis. Many prediction methods have recently been proposed, but the predictive accuracy of difficult cell type identification tasks is still low. In this work, we proposed a novel Gaussian noise augmentation-based scRNA-seq contrastive learning method (GsRCL) to learn a type of discriminative feature representations for cell type identification tasks. A large-scale computational evaluation suggests that GsRCL successfully outperformed other state-of-the-art predictive methods on difficult cell type identification tasks, while the conventional random genes masking augmentation-based contrastive learning method also improved the accuracy of easy cell type identification tasks in general.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ibrahim Alsaggaf
- School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, Malet Street, WC1E 7HX, London, United Kingdom
| | - Daniel Buchan
- Department of Computer Science, University College London, Gower Street, WC1E 6BT, London, United Kingdom
| | - Cen Wan
- School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, Malet Street, WC1E 7HX, London, United Kingdom
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2
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Humphreys DT, Lewis A, Pan‐Castillo B, Berti G, Mein C, Wozniak E, Gordon H, Gadhok R, Minicozzi A, ChinAleong J, Feakins R, Giannoulatou E, James LK, Stagg AJ, Lindsay JO, Silver A. Single cell sequencing data identify distinct B cell and fibroblast populations in stricturing Crohn's disease. J Cell Mol Med 2024; 28:e18344. [PMID: 38685679 PMCID: PMC11058334 DOI: 10.1111/jcmm.18344] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/27/2023] [Revised: 02/20/2024] [Accepted: 04/05/2024] [Indexed: 05/02/2024] Open
Abstract
Single cell RNA sequencing of human full thickness Crohn's disease (CD) small bowel resection specimens was used to identify potential therapeutic targets for stricturing (S) CD. Using an unbiased approach, 16 cell lineages were assigned within 14,539 sequenced cells from patient-matched SCD and non-stricturing (NSCD) preparations. SCD and NSCD contained identical cell types. Amongst immune cells, B cells and plasma cells were selectively increased in SCD samples. B cell subsets suggested formation of tertiary lymphoid tissue in SCD and compared with NSCD there was an increase in IgG, and a decrease in IgA plasma cells, consistent with their potential role in CD fibrosis. Two Lumican-positive fibroblast subtypes were identified and subclassified based on expression of selectively enriched genes as fibroblast clusters (C) 12 and C9. Cells within these clusters expressed the profibrotic genes Decorin (C12) and JUN (C9). C9 cells expressed ACTA2; ECM genes COL4A1, COL4A2, COL15A1, COL6A3, COL18A1 and ADAMDEC1; LAMB1 and GREM1. GO and KEGG Biological terms showed extracellular matrix and stricture organization associated with C12 and C9, and regulation of WNT pathway genes with C9. Trajectory and differential gene analysis of C12 and C9 identified four sub-clusters. Intra sub-cluster gene analysis detected 13 co-regulated gene modules that aligned along predicted pseudotime trajectories. CXCL14 and ADAMDEC1 were key markers in module 1. Our findings support further investigation of fibroblast heterogeneity and interactions with local and circulating immune cells at earlier time points in fibrosis progression. Breaking these interactions by targeting one or other population may improve therapeutic management for SCD.
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Affiliation(s)
- David T. Humphreys
- Victor Chang Cardiac Research InstituteSydneyNew South WalesAustralia
- St Vincent's Clinical SchoolUniversity of New South WalesSydneyNew South WalesAustralia
| | - Amy Lewis
- Centre for Genomics and Child Health, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Belen Pan‐Castillo
- Centre for Genomics and Child Health, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Giulio Berti
- Centre for Genomics and Child Health, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Charles Mein
- Genome Centre, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Eva Wozniak
- Genome Centre, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Hannah Gordon
- Centre for Immunobiology, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Radha Gadhok
- Centre for Immunobiology, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Annamaria Minicozzi
- Department of Colorectal Surgery, Division of Surgery and Perioperative CareThe Royal London HospitalLondonUK
| | | | - Roger Feakins
- Department of Cellular PathologyRoyal Free London NHS Foundation TrustLondonUK
| | - Eleni Giannoulatou
- Victor Chang Cardiac Research InstituteSydneyNew South WalesAustralia
- St Vincent's Clinical SchoolUniversity of New South WalesSydneyNew South WalesAustralia
| | - Louisa K. James
- Centre for Immunobiology, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Andrew J. Stagg
- Centre for Immunobiology, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - James Oliver Lindsay
- Centre for Immunobiology, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
| | - Andrew Silver
- Centre for Genomics and Child Health, Blizard InstituteBarts and The London School of Medicine and DentistryLondonUK
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Choi JM, Park C, Chae H. moSCminer: a cell subtype classification framework based on the attention neural network integrating the single-cell multi-omics dataset on the cloud. PeerJ 2024; 12:e17006. [PMID: 38426141 PMCID: PMC10903350 DOI: 10.7717/peerj.17006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/22/2023] [Accepted: 02/05/2024] [Indexed: 03/02/2024] Open
Abstract
Single-cell omics sequencing has rapidly advanced, enabling the quantification of diverse omics profiles at a single-cell resolution. To facilitate comprehensive biological insights, such as cellular differentiation trajectories, precise annotation of cell subtypes is essential. Conventional methods involve clustering cells and manually assigning subtypes based on canonical markers, a labor-intensive and expert-dependent process. Hence, an automated computational prediction framework is crucial. While several classification frameworks for predicting cell subtypes from single-cell RNA sequencing datasets exist, these methods solely rely on single-omics data, offering insights at a single molecular level. They often miss inter-omic correlations and a holistic understanding of cellular processes. To address this, the integration of multi-omics datasets from individual cells is essential for accurate subtype annotation. This article introduces moSCminer, a novel framework for classifying cell subtypes that harnesses the power of single-cell multi-omics sequencing datasets through an attention-based neural network operating at the omics level. By integrating three distinct omics datasets-gene expression, DNA methylation, and DNA accessibility-while accounting for their biological relationships, moSCminer excels at learning the relative significance of each omics feature. It then transforms this knowledge into a novel representation for cell subtype classification. Comparative evaluations against standard machine learning-based classifiers demonstrate moSCminer's superior performance, consistently achieving the highest average performance on real datasets. The efficacy of multi-omics integration is further corroborated through an in-depth analysis of the omics-level attention module, which identifies potential markers for cell subtype annotation. To enhance accessibility and scalability, moSCminer is accessible as a user-friendly web-based platform seamlessly connected to a cloud system, publicly accessible at http://203.252.206.118:5568. Notably, this study marks the pioneering integration of three single-cell multi-omics datasets for cell subtype identification.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joung Min Choi
- Department of Computer Science, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), Blacksburg, Virginia, United States
| | - Chaelin Park
- Division of Computer Science, Sookmyung Women’s University, Seoul, South Korea
| | - Heejoon Chae
- Division of Computer Science, Sookmyung Women’s University, Seoul, South Korea
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4
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Wang X, Chai Z, Li S, Liu Y, Li C, Jiang Y, Liu Q. CTISL: a dynamic stacking multi-class classification approach for identifying cell types from single-cell RNA-seq data. Bioinformatics 2024; 40:btae063. [PMID: 38317054 PMCID: PMC10873586 DOI: 10.1093/bioinformatics/btae063] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/15/2024] [Revised: 02/15/2024] [Accepted: 02/15/2024] [Indexed: 02/07/2024] Open
Abstract
MOTIVATION Effective identification of cell types is of critical importance in single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) data analysis. To date, many supervised machine learning-based predictors have been implemented to identify cell types from scRNA-seq datasets. Despite the technical advances of these state-of-the-art tools, most existing predictors were single classifiers, of which the performances can still be significantly improved. It is therefore highly desirable to employ the ensemble learning strategy to develop more accurate computational models for robust and comprehensive identification of cell types on scRNA-seq datasets. RESULTS We propose a two-layer stacking model, termed CTISL (Cell Type Identification by Stacking ensemble Learning), which integrates multiple classifiers to identify cell types. In the first layer, given a reference scRNA-seq dataset with known cell types, CTISL dynamically combines multiple cell-type-specific classifiers (i.e. support-vector machine and logistic regression) as the base learners to deliver the outcomes for the input of a meta-classifier in the second layer. We conducted a total of 24 benchmarking experiments on 17 human and mouse scRNA-seq datasets to evaluate and compare the prediction performance of CTISL and other state-of-the-art predictors. The experiment results demonstrate that CTISL achieves superior or competitive performance compared to these state-of-the-art approaches. We anticipate that CTISL can serve as a useful and reliable tool for cost-effective identification of cell types from scRNA-seq datasets. AVAILABILITY AND IMPLEMENTATION The webserver and source code are freely available at http://bigdata.biocie.cn/CTISLweb/home and https://zenodo.org/records/10568906, respectively.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiao Wang
- Department of Software Engineering, College of Information Engineering, Northwest A&F University, Yangling 712100, China
| | - Ziyi Chai
- Department of Software Engineering, College of Information Engineering, Northwest A&F University, Yangling 712100, China
| | - Shaohua Li
- Department of Software Engineering, College of Information Engineering, Northwest A&F University, Yangling 712100, China
| | - Yan Liu
- School of Computer Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing 210094, China
| | - Chen Li
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Monash University, Melbourne, VIC 3800, Australia
| | - Yu Jiang
- Department of Animal Genetics, Breeding and Reproduction, College of Animal Science and Technology, Northwest A&F University, Yangling 712100, China
| | - Quanzhong Liu
- Department of Software Engineering, College of Information Engineering, Northwest A&F University, Yangling 712100, China
- Shaanxi Engineering Research Center of Agricultural Information Intelligent Perception and Analysis, Northwest A&F University, Yangling 712100, China
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Fiannaca A, La Rosa M, La Paglia L, Gaglio S, Urso A. GOWDL: gene ontology-driven wide and deep learning model for cell typing of scRNA-seq data. Brief Bioinform 2023; 24:bbad332. [PMID: 37756593 PMCID: PMC10530315 DOI: 10.1093/bib/bbad332] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/03/2023] [Revised: 08/17/2023] [Accepted: 09/04/2023] [Indexed: 09/29/2023] Open
Abstract
Single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) allows for obtaining genomic and transcriptomic profiles of individual cells. That data make it possible to characterize tissues at the cell level. In this context, one of the main analyses exploiting scRNA-seq data is identifying the cell types within tissue to estimate the quantitative composition of cell populations. Due to the massive amount of available scRNA-seq data, automatic classification approaches for cell typing, based on the most recent deep learning technology, are needed. Here, we present the gene ontology-driven wide and deep learning (GOWDL) model for classifying cell types in several tissues. GOWDL implements a hybrid architecture that considers the functional annotations found in Gene Ontology and the marker genes typical of specific cell types. We performed cross-validation and independent external testing, comparing our algorithm with 12 other state-of-the-art predictors. Classification scores demonstrated that GOWDL reached the best results over five different tissues, except for recall, where we got about 92% versus 97% of the best tool. Finally, we presented a case study on classifying immune cell populations in breast cancer using a hierarchical approach based on GOWDL.
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Affiliation(s)
- Antonino Fiannaca
- ICAR-CNR, National Research Council of Italy, Via Ugo La Malfa 153, 90146, Palermo, Italy
| | - Massimo La Rosa
- ICAR-CNR, National Research Council of Italy, Via Ugo La Malfa 153, 90146, Palermo, Italy
| | - Laura La Paglia
- ICAR-CNR, National Research Council of Italy, Via Ugo La Malfa 153, 90146, Palermo, Italy
| | - Salvatore Gaglio
- ICAR-CNR, National Research Council of Italy, Via Ugo La Malfa 153, 90146, Palermo, Italy
- Dipartimento di Ingegneria, Università degli studi di Palermo, Viale Delle Scienze, ed. 6, 90128, Palermo, Italy
| | - Alfonso Urso
- ICAR-CNR, National Research Council of Italy, Via Ugo La Malfa 153, 90146, Palermo, Italy
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Cheng Y, Fan X, Zhang J, Li Y. A scalable sparse neural network framework for rare cell type annotation of single-cell transcriptome data. Commun Biol 2023; 6:545. [PMID: 37210444 DOI: 10.1038/s42003-023-04928-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/13/2023] [Accepted: 05/11/2023] [Indexed: 05/22/2023] Open
Abstract
Automatic cell type annotation methods are increasingly used in single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) analysis due to their fast and precise advantages. However, current methods often fail to account for the imbalance of scRNA-seq datasets and ignore information from smaller populations, leading to significant biological analysis errors. Here, we introduce scBalance, an integrated sparse neural network framework that incorporates adaptive weight sampling and dropout techniques for auto-annotation tasks. Using 20 scRNA-seq datasets with varying scales and degrees of imbalance, we demonstrate that scBalance outperforms current methods in both intra- and inter-dataset annotation tasks. Additionally, scBalance displays impressive scalability in identifying rare cell types in million-level datasets, as shown in the bronchoalveolar cell landscape. scBalance is also significantly faster than commonly used tools and comes in a user-friendly format, making it a superior tool for scRNA-seq analysis on the Python-based platform.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yuqi Cheng
- Department of Computer Science and Engineering (CSE), The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), Hong Kong SAR, China
- School of Computational Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA
| | - Xingyu Fan
- School of Information and Software Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, 610054, Chengdu, China
| | - Jianing Zhang
- Department of Computer Science and Engineering (CSE), The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), Hong Kong SAR, China
| | - Yu Li
- Department of Computer Science and Engineering (CSE), The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), Hong Kong SAR, China.
- The CUHK Shenzhen Research Institute, Hi-Tech Park, Nanshan, 518057, Shenzhen, China.
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Lee J, Kim M, Kang K, Yang CS, Yoon S. Hierarchical cell-type identifier accurately distinguishes immune-cell subtypes enabling precise profiling of tissue microenvironment with single-cell RNA-sequencing. Brief Bioinform 2023; 24:6995373. [PMID: 36681937 PMCID: PMC10025442 DOI: 10.1093/bib/bbad006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/07/2022] [Revised: 12/22/2022] [Accepted: 01/02/2023] [Indexed: 01/23/2023] Open
Abstract
Single-cell RNA-seq enabled in-depth study on tissue micro-environment and immune-profiling, where a crucial step is to annotate cell identity. Immune cells play key roles in many diseases, whereas their activities are hard to track due to their diverse and highly variable nature. Existing cell-type identifiers had limited performance for this purpose. We present HiCAT, a hierarchical, marker-based cell-type identifier utilising gene set analysis for statistical scoring for given markers. It features successive identification of major-type, minor-type and subsets utilising subset markers structured in a three-level taxonomy tree. Comparison with manual annotation and pairwise match test showed HiCAT outperforms others in major- and minor-type identification. For subsets, we qualitatively evaluated the marker expression profile demonstrating that HiCAT provide the clearest immune-cell landscape. HiCAT was also used for immune-cell profiling in ulcerative colitis and discovered distinct features of the disease in macrophage and T-cell subsets that could not be identified previously.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joongho Lee
- Dept. of Computer Science, College of SW Convergence, Dankook University, Yongin-si, Korea, 16890
| | - Minsoo Kim
- Dept. of Computer Science, College of SW Convergence, Dankook University, Yongin-si, Korea, 16890
| | - Keunsoo Kang
- Dept. of Microbiology, College of Natural Sciences, Dankook University, Cheonan-si, Korea, 31116
| | - Chul-Su Yang
- Dept. of Molecular and Life Science, Center for Bionano Intelligence Education and Research, Hanyang University, Ansan, Korea, 15588
| | - Seokhyun Yoon
- Dept. of Electronics & Electrical Eng., College of Engineering, Dankook University, Yongin-si Korea, 16890
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Cuevas-Diaz Duran R, González-Orozco JC, Velasco I, Wu JQ. Single-cell and single-nuclei RNA sequencing as powerful tools to decipher cellular heterogeneity and dysregulation in neurodegenerative diseases. Front Cell Dev Biol 2022; 10:884748. [PMID: 36353512 PMCID: PMC9637968 DOI: 10.3389/fcell.2022.884748] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/27/2022] [Accepted: 10/06/2022] [Indexed: 08/10/2023] Open
Abstract
Neurodegenerative diseases affect millions of people worldwide and there are currently no cures. Two types of common neurodegenerative diseases are Alzheimer's (AD) and Parkinson's disease (PD). Single-cell and single-nuclei RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq and snRNA-seq) have become powerful tools to elucidate the inherent complexity and dynamics of the central nervous system at cellular resolution. This technology has allowed the identification of cell types and states, providing new insights into cellular susceptibilities and molecular mechanisms underlying neurodegenerative conditions. Exciting research using high throughput scRNA-seq and snRNA-seq technologies to study AD and PD is emerging. Herein we review the recent progress in understanding these neurodegenerative diseases using these state-of-the-art technologies. We discuss the fundamental principles and implications of single-cell sequencing of the human brain. Moreover, we review some examples of the computational and analytical tools required to interpret the extensive amount of data generated from these assays. We conclude by highlighting challenges and limitations in the application of these technologies in the study of AD and PD.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | - Iván Velasco
- Instituto de Fisiología Celular—Neurociencias, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, Mexico
- Laboratorio de Reprogramación Celular, Instituto Nacional de Neurología y Neurocirugía “Manuel Velasco Suárez”, Mexico City, Mexico
| | - Jia Qian Wu
- The Vivian L. Smith Department of Neurosurgery, McGovern Medical School, The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, TX, United States
- Center for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine, UT Brown Foundation Institute of Molecular Medicine, Houston, TX, United States
- MD Anderson Cancer Center UTHealth Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Houston, TX, United States
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