Systemic analysis of tissue cells potentially vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 infection by the protein-proofed single-cell RNA profiling of ACE2, TMPRSS2 and Furin proteases

Lulin Zhou; Zubiao Niu; Xiaoyi Jiang; Zhengrong Zhang; You Zheng; Zhongyi Wang; Yichao Zhu; Lihua Gao; Xiaoning Wang; Qiang Sun

In the ACE2-medium tissues, we found the AT2 cells, and macrophages as well, in the lung possessed the co-expression feature ( Figure 5A) , which provided the hard evidence that SARS-CoV-2 posed the serious threat to the lung. Moreover, we observed a significant co-expression of the ACE2 gene with TMPRSS2 and Furin in the epithelial cells and HLC of the fetal adrenal gland ( Figure 5H ), manifesting that the fetal adrenal gland may be a target of SARS-CoV-2. Furthermore, in consistence with the results above, a portion of cardiomyocytes simultaneously expressed ACE2 and Furin ( Figure 5B) . However, few cells co-expressed ACE2, TMPRSS2 and Furin simultaneously in the ovary ( Figure 5G ) and thyroid gland ( Figure S3K-L) .