A shared disease-associated oligodendrocyte signature among multiple CNS pathologies

• Published in: Nature neuroscience 2022-07, Vol.25 (7), p.876-886
• Main Authors: Kenigsbuch, Mor, Bost, Pierre, Halevi, Shahar, Chang, Yuzhou, Chen, Shuo, Ma, Qin, Hajbi, Renana, Schwikowski, Benno, Bodenmiller, Bernd, Fu, Hongjun, Schwartz, Michal, Amit, Ido
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 13/1; 13/106; 13/31; 13/51; 38/91; 631/337/2019; 631/378/1689/1283; 631/378/2596/1705; 64/110; 64/60; Alzheimer Disease; Alzheimer Disease - metabolism; Alzheimer's disease; Amyloid beta-Peptides; Amyloid beta-Peptides - metabolism; Amyloid beta-Protein Precursor; Amyloid beta-Protein Precursor - metabolism; Amyloidosis; Animal Genetics and Genomics; Animal models; Animals; Behavioral Sciences; Biological Techniques; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Biomedicine; Brain; Brain - metabolism; Brain damage; Brain injury; Central nervous system; Cognitive ability; Cognitive science; Disease Models, Animal; Humans; Inflammation; Markers; Mice; Mice, Transgenic; Neurobiology; Neurodegenerative Diseases; Neurodegenerative Diseases - pathology; Neuroscience; Neurosciences; Oligodendrocytes; Oligodendroglia; Oligodendroglia - metabolism; Pathology; Plaque, Amyloid; Plaque, Amyloid - metabolism; Population studies; Populations; Senile plaques; Spatial analysis; Tau protein; Transcriptomics
• ISSN: 1097-6256; 1546-1726
• DOI: 10.1038/s41593-022-01104-7

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a complex neurodegenerative disease, perturbing neuronal and non-neuronal cell populations. In this study, using single-cell transcriptomics, we mapped all non-immune, non-neuronal cell populations in wild-type and AD model (5xFAD) mouse brains. We identified an oligodendrocyte state that increased in association with brain pathology, which we termed disease-associated oligodendrocytes (DOLs). In a murine model of amyloidosis, DOLs appear long after plaque accumulation, and amyloid-beta (Aβ) alone was not sufficient to induce the DOL signature in vitro. DOLs could be identified in a mouse model of tauopathy and in other murine neurodegenerative and autoimmune inflammatory conditions, suggesting a common response to severe pathological conditions. Using quantitative spatial analysis of mouse and postmortem human brain tissues, we found that oligodendrocytes expressing a key DOL marker (SERPINA3N/SERPINA3 accordingly) are present in the cortex in areas of brain damage and are enriched near Aβ plaques. In postmortem human brain tissue, the expression level of this marker correlated with cognitive decline. Altogether, this study uncovers a shared signature of oligodendrocytes in central nervous system pathologies. We identified an oligodendrocyte signature associated with brain pathology in the 5xFAD model of amyloidosis, which we termed disease-associated oligodendrocytes. This signature was found to be shared by oligodendrocytes across pathologies.