Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex

Experimental models of the human brain are needed for basic understanding of its development and disease1. Human brain organoids hold unprecedented promise for this purpose; however, they are plagued by high organoid-to-organoid variability2,3. This has raised doubts as to whether developmental proc...

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Main Author: Regev, Aviv
Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Biology
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Springer Science and Business Media LLC 2020
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125050
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author Regev, Aviv
author2 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Biology
author_facet Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Biology
Regev, Aviv
author_sort Regev, Aviv
collection MIT
description Experimental models of the human brain are needed for basic understanding of its development and disease1. Human brain organoids hold unprecedented promise for this purpose; however, they are plagued by high organoid-to-organoid variability2,3. This has raised doubts as to whether developmental processes of the human brain can occur outside the context of embryogenesis with a degree of reproducibility that is comparable to the endogenous tissue. Here we show that an organoid model of the dorsal forebrain can reliably generate a rich diversity of cell types appropriate for the human cerebral cortex. We performed single-cell RNA-sequencing analysis of 166,242 cells isolated from 21 individual organoids, finding that 95% of the organoids generate a virtually indistinguishable compendium of cell types, following similar developmental trajectories and with a degree of organoid-to-organoid variability comparable to that of individual endogenous brains. Furthermore, organoids derived from different stem cell lines show consistent reproducibility in the cell types produced. The data demonstrate that reproducible development of the complex cellular diversity of the central nervous system does not require the context of the embryo, and that establishment of terminal cell identity is a highly constrained process that can emerge from diverse stem cell origins and growth environments.
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spelling mit-1721.1/1250502022-10-03T07:36:15Z Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex Regev, Aviv Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Biology Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT Experimental models of the human brain are needed for basic understanding of its development and disease1. Human brain organoids hold unprecedented promise for this purpose; however, they are plagued by high organoid-to-organoid variability2,3. This has raised doubts as to whether developmental processes of the human brain can occur outside the context of embryogenesis with a degree of reproducibility that is comparable to the endogenous tissue. Here we show that an organoid model of the dorsal forebrain can reliably generate a rich diversity of cell types appropriate for the human cerebral cortex. We performed single-cell RNA-sequencing analysis of 166,242 cells isolated from 21 individual organoids, finding that 95% of the organoids generate a virtually indistinguishable compendium of cell types, following similar developmental trajectories and with a degree of organoid-to-organoid variability comparable to that of individual endogenous brains. Furthermore, organoids derived from different stem cell lines show consistent reproducibility in the cell types produced. The data demonstrate that reproducible development of the complex cellular diversity of the central nervous system does not require the context of the embryo, and that establishment of terminal cell identity is a highly constrained process that can emerge from diverse stem cell origins and growth environments. 2020-05-06T15:28:41Z 2020-05-06T15:28:41Z 2019-06 2020-01-28T17:30:08Z Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 0028-0836 https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125050 Velasco, Silvia et al. “Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex.” Nature 570 (2019): 523-527 © 2019 The Author(s) en 10.1038/S41586-019-1289-X Nature Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use. application/pdf Springer Science and Business Media LLC PMC
spellingShingle Regev, Aviv
Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex
title Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex
title_full Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex
title_fullStr Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex
title_full_unstemmed Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex
title_short Individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex
title_sort individual brain organoids reproducibly form cell diversity of the human cerebral cortex
url https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125050
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