Single-cell RNA sequencing to explore composition of peripheral blood NK cells in patients with chronic myeloid leukemia in treatment-free remission

Abstract

This study was to explore the role of NK cell subsets and gene expression in maintaining TFR status. We identified six types of NK cells in the PBMCs over both groups (healthy controls and patients with TFR). Gene Oncology analysis showed that up regulated genes were enriched in the categories of “immune response,” “reaction to tumor cells,” and “cytolysis.” In addition, we found that the three NK cell subsets, mature and terminal NK cells, CD56 bright NK cells, and transitional NK cells, contained many significantly up regulated genes in both groups, and that CD56 bright NK cells and transitional NK cells in patients with CML-TFR were in a proliferating and activated state. Through single-cell RNA sequencing analysis, we confirmed that the mature and terminal, CD56 bright, and transitional subsets of NK cells play an indispensable role in maintaining TFR in patients with CML.

Keywords:

• Chronic myelogenous leukemia
• NK cell subtypes
• single-cell RNA sequencing
• treatment-free remission

Ethics approval statement and informed consent

We obtained written informed consent from all participants and obtained ethical approval from the Research Ethics Committee of Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University (NFEC-2021-130). All research reported in submitted papers has been conducted in an ethical and responsible manner, and is in full compliance with all relevant codes of experimentation and legislation.

Author contributions

All authors were responsible for the conception and design of the manuscript. GPY contributed to draft the manuscript. GPY, WXL, XFC, YLL, JXL, ZXZ and CXY contributed to perform the experiments, extract and analyze the data and interpret the results. DX was responsible for preparing the figures, acquiring the funding, collecting the clinical samples and revising critically to the manuscript. All authors have read and approved the final version.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflict of interest.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author by reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

The present study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under grant [number 81870128, 82070133]; Clinical Research Program of Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University under grant [number LC2016YM006]; the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province under grant [number 2020A1515011514, 2021A1515012103].