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Comment
. 2021 Apr 26;19(4):e3001217.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001217. eCollection 2021 Apr.

The first few days of a SARS-CoV-2 infection viewed at single-cell resolution

Tom Gallagher  1 , Paul B McCray Jr  2
Affiliations
Comment

The first few days of a SARS-CoV-2 infection viewed at single-cell resolution

Tom Gallagher et al. PLoS Biol. .

Abstract

What transpires soon after inhaling Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the respiratory virus causing Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)? Where does infection begin? What are the features of subsequent virus spread? How might host responses quickly contain infection? Two recently published manuscripts have evaluated infection in primary cultures of well-differentiated cells to address these questions and bring more light on the proviral and antiviral components operating during the initial days after SARS-CoV-2 exposure.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1. Single-cell resolution of SARS-CoV-2 infection.
Primary cultures of well-differentiated bronchial epithelial cells, grown on permeable supports at ALIs, are infected with SARS-CoV-2, then separated for subsequent single-cell RNA sequencing. Using t-SNE statistical methods, cells with similar transcriptome profiles are group-clustered on two-dimensional plots. Individual cells containing SARS-CoV-2 RNAs and antiviral interferon transcripts are identified within clusters. Images were created with BioRender.com. ALI, air–liquid interface; SARS-CoV-2, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2; t-SNE, t-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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