A single-cell atlas of the mouse and human prostate reveals heterogeneity and conservation of epithelial progenitors. Academic Article uri icon

Overview

abstract

  • Understanding the cellular constituents of the prostate is essential for identifying the cell of origin for prostate adenocarcinoma. Here, we describe a comprehensive single-cell atlas of the adult mouse prostate epithelium, which displays extensive heterogeneity. We observe distal lobe-specific luminal epithelial populations (LumA, LumD, LumL, and LumV), a proximally enriched luminal population (LumP) that is not lobe-specific, and a periurethral population (PrU) that shares both basal and luminal features. Functional analyses suggest that LumP and PrU cells have multipotent progenitor activity in organoid formation and tissue reconstitution assays. Furthermore, we show that mouse distal and proximal luminal cells are most similar to human acinar and ductal populations, that a PrU-like population is conserved between species, and that the mouse lateral prostate is most similar to the human peripheral zone. Our findings elucidate new prostate epithelial progenitors, and help resolve long-standing questions about anatomical relationships between the mouse and human prostate.

publication date

  • September 11, 2020

Research

keywords

  • Epithelial Cells
  • Prostate
  • Stem Cells

Identity

PubMed Central ID

  • PMC7529463

Scopus Document Identifier

  • 85092071236

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

  • 10.7554/eLife.59465

PubMed ID

  • 32915138

Additional Document Info

volume

  • 9