1
|
Mayr CH, Sengupta A, Asgharpour S, Ansari M, Pestoni JC, Ogar P, Angelidis I, Liontos A, Rodriguez-Castillo JA, Lang NJ, Strunz M, Porras-Gonzalez D, Gerckens M, De Sadeleer LJ, Oehrle B, Viteri-Alvarez V, Fernandez IE, Tallquist M, Irmler M, Beckers J, Eickelberg O, Stoleriu GM, Behr J, Kneidinger N, Wuyts WA, Wasnick RM, Yildirim AÖ, Ahlbrecht K, Morty RE, Samakovlis C, Theis FJ, Burgstaller G, Schiller HB. Sfrp1 inhibits lung fibroblast invasion during transition to injury-induced myofibroblasts. Eur Respir J 2024; 63:2301326. [PMID: 38212077 PMCID: PMC10850614 DOI: 10.1183/13993003.01326-2023] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/19/2023] [Accepted: 11/13/2023] [Indexed: 01/13/2024]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Fibroblast-to-myofibroblast conversion is a major driver of tissue remodelling in organ fibrosis. Distinct lineages of fibroblasts support homeostatic tissue niche functions, yet their specific activation states and phenotypic trajectories during injury and repair have remained unclear. METHODS We combined spatial transcriptomics, multiplexed immunostainings, longitudinal single-cell RNA-sequencing and genetic lineage tracing to study fibroblast fates during mouse lung regeneration. Our findings were validated in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patient tissues in situ as well as in cell differentiation and invasion assays using patient lung fibroblasts. Cell differentiation and invasion assays established a function of SFRP1 in regulating human lung fibroblast invasion in response to transforming growth factor (TGF)β1. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS We discovered a transitional fibroblast state characterised by high Sfrp1 expression, derived from both Tcf21-Cre lineage positive and negative cells. Sfrp1 + cells appeared early after injury in peribronchiolar, adventitial and alveolar locations and preceded the emergence of myofibroblasts. We identified lineage-specific paracrine signals and inferred converging transcriptional trajectories towards Sfrp1 + transitional fibroblasts and Cthrc1 + myofibroblasts. TGFβ1 downregulated SFRP1 in noninvasive transitional cells and induced their switch to an invasive CTHRC1+ myofibroblast identity. Finally, using loss-of-function studies we showed that SFRP1 modulates TGFβ1-induced fibroblast invasion and RHOA pathway activity. CONCLUSIONS Our study reveals the convergence of spatially and transcriptionally distinct fibroblast lineages into transcriptionally uniform myofibroblasts and identifies SFRP1 as a modulator of TGFβ1-driven fibroblast phenotypes in fibrogenesis. These findings are relevant in the context of therapeutic interventions that aim at limiting or reversing fibroblast foci formation.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Christoph H Mayr
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
- C.H. Mayr and A. Sengupta contributed equally to this work
| | - Arunima Sengupta
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
- C.H. Mayr and A. Sengupta contributed equally to this work
| | - Sara Asgharpour
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Meshal Ansari
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
- Institute of Computational Biology, Helmholtz Munich, Munich, Germany
| | - Jeanine C Pestoni
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Paulina Ogar
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Ilias Angelidis
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Andreas Liontos
- Department of Molecular Biosciences, The Wenner-Gren Institute, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
- SciLifeLab, Stockholm, Sweden
| | | | - Niklas J Lang
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Maximilian Strunz
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Diana Porras-Gonzalez
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Michael Gerckens
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
- Department of Internal Medicine V, Ludwig-Maximilians University (LMU) Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), CPC-M bioArchive, Munich, Germany
| | - Laurens J De Sadeleer
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
- Laboratory of Respiratory Diseases and Thoracic Surgery (BREATHE), Department CHROMETA, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
| | - Bettina Oehrle
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Valeria Viteri-Alvarez
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Isis E Fernandez
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Michelle Tallquist
- Center for Cardiovascular Research, John A. Burns School of Medicine, University of Hawaii, Honolulu, HI, USA
| | - Martin Irmler
- Institute of Experimental Genetics, Helmholtz Zentrum München, Neuherberg, Germany
| | - Johannes Beckers
- Institute of Experimental Genetics, Helmholtz Zentrum München, Neuherberg, Germany
- German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD e.V.), Neuherberg, Germany
- Chair of Experimental Genetics, Technical University of Munich, Freising, Germany
| | - Oliver Eickelberg
- Division of Pulmonary, Allergy, and Critical Care Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
| | - Gabriel Mircea Stoleriu
- Department of Internal Medicine V, Ludwig-Maximilians University (LMU) Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), CPC-M bioArchive, Munich, Germany
| | - Jürgen Behr
- Department of Internal Medicine V, Ludwig-Maximilians University (LMU) Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), CPC-M bioArchive, Munich, Germany
| | - Nikolaus Kneidinger
- Department of Internal Medicine V, Ludwig-Maximilians University (LMU) Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), CPC-M bioArchive, Munich, Germany
| | - Wim A Wuyts
- Laboratory of Respiratory Diseases and Thoracic Surgery (BREATHE), Department CHROMETA, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
| | - Roxana Maria Wasnick
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
| | - Ali Önder Yildirim
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
- Institute of Experimental Pneumology, LMU University Hospital, Ludwig-Maximilians University, Munich, Germany
| | - Katrin Ahlbrecht
- Max Planck Institute for Heart and Lung Research, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Bad Nauheim, Germany
| | - Rory E Morty
- Department of Translational Pulmonology, University Hospital Heidelberg, and Translational Lung Research Center (TLRC), Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Christos Samakovlis
- Department of Molecular Biosciences, The Wenner-Gren Institute, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
- SciLifeLab, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Fabian J Theis
- Institute of Computational Biology, Helmholtz Munich, Munich, Germany
- Department of Mathematics, Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany
| | - Gerald Burgstaller
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
- G. Burgstaller and H.B. Schiller contributed equally to this article as lead authors and supervised the work
| | - Herbert B Schiller
- Comprehensive Pneumology Center (CPC)/Institute of Lung Health and Immunity (LHI), Helmholtz Munich, Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Munich, Germany
- Institute of Experimental Pneumology, LMU University Hospital, Ludwig-Maximilians University, Munich, Germany
- G. Burgstaller and H.B. Schiller contributed equally to this article as lead authors and supervised the work
| |
Collapse
|