Research and development of taste bud organoid with cell polarity

2021 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20K18457
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Early-Career Scientists
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: Basic Section 57010:Oral biological science-related
• Research Institution: Kyushu University
• Principal Investigator: Takai Shingo 九州大学, 歯学研究院, 助教 (30760475)
• Project Period (FY): 2020-04-01 – 2022-03-31
• Keywords: 味細胞 / オルガノイド / FACS / RNAシークエンス

Outline of Final Research Achievements

In this study, I explored the factor which provides cell polarity and specific character to the taste cells, by using a 3-dimensional taste stem cell culture "taste bud organoid" and single-cell transcriptome analysis. In the taste bud organoid colonies, many taste cells expressed villin at the end of the cells, even the cells were embedded deeply inside the colony. That implies the taste cells acquire cell polarity during their maturation process, regardless of the exposure to the outside environment. In addition, the high-throughput single-cell RNA sequencing, combined with FACS was performed on Gnat3-GFP-expressing transgenic mice, which can identified type II taste cells with fluorescent label. The data indicated the startling heterogeneity in single-cell taste cell gene expression profiles, contributing to our fundamental knowledge of the characterization of α-gustducin-expressing taste cells.

Free Research Field

生理学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究では、味細胞の３次元培養系における味細胞の配向と、味細胞の遺伝子発現に着目し実験を開始した。その結果、３次元培養コロニー中の成熟味細胞の頂端側にはvillinが発現しており、細胞がコロニー内部に埋没していても味細胞は極性を獲得していることがわかった。また、個々の味細胞の性質を探索するために、単一トランスクリプトーム解析を試みた結果、世界に先駆けて舌前方部に存在する茸状乳頭に含まれる特定の味細胞群の収集とその遺伝子発現の網羅解析に成功した。本研究は味細胞培養技術の改善、および味細胞の性質を決定する遺伝子発現に関する基礎的知識を提供する。