Lung researchers have a valuable new tool at their disposal with the creation of the Human Lung Atlas, the most comprehensive cell map of the human lungs ever created. The new cell map has uncovered the immense diversity of cell types found in the lungs, along with providing insight into lung diseases.
The research, published in Nature Medicine, is part of a larger global effort to map every human cell type as part of the Human Cell Atlas. The Human Lung Atlas was created by utilizing machine learning to combine nearly 40 studies datasets, that span over 2.4 million cells. Already the atlas has brought to light rare cell types, as well as found cell commonality between various lung diseases providing a new way to understand diseases and develop novel treatment methods.
“This is the first effort to compare healthy and diseased lungs in one study in an integrated way,” said Professor Martijn Nawijn - University Medical Center Groningen, the Netherlands. “Our study not only supports the presence of lung fibrosis in COVID-19, it allows us to identify and define a shared cell state between lung fibrosis, COVID-19 and lung cancer patients. Finding these shared disease-associated cells is really exciting, and reveals a totally different way of looking at lung diseases, opening possibilities for novel treatment targets and developing treatment response biomarkers. Our findings also suggest that therapies working for one disease may help alleviate others.”
The Human Lung Atlas provides researchers with new lung biology information which will foster the development of novel lung disease treatments and provide a better understanding of how these treatments could potentially be used to treat an array of lung diseases.