Characterization of germinal center and circulating T follicular helper cells using both intracellular and surface CITE-seq

Abstract T follicular helper (TFH) cells are a CD4+ cell subset that play critical role in the formation of germinal centers (GC). TFH essential to produce protective antibody responses through regulation clonal selection & differentiation into activated antibody-secreting memory B cells. is multistep process begins with presentation antigen by dendritic naïve cells, where commit lineage expressing defining transcription factor lymphoma 6 (Bcl-6). phenotypically characterized high expression C-X-C chemokine receptor 5 (CXCR5) programmed death-1 (PD-1) on surface. CXCR5+ present peripheral blood represent circulating (cTFH) subset. In contrast cTFH may express low levels Bcl-6 numerous reports subsets differ both functionally. Here we characterise heterogeneous using combination intracellular CITE-seq, surface CITE-seq and whole transcriptome single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) analysis. Germinal center were enriched sorting CD4+, CXCR5+, PD-1+, respectively. We examined other factors, protein data, across pre-TFH, Together, these data demonstrate how scRNA-seq be used deepen our understanding states at abundance, enabling detection along high-quality mRNA.