Cell-cell communication analysis for single-cell RNA sequencing and its applications in carcinogenesis and COVID-19

Abstract

Cell-cell communication is the basis of physiological processes and cell signals. The disease occurs when the cells do not adequately communicate and the messages are blocked. With ligand-receptor interaction databases and single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) databases, we can detect intercellular signaling and reconstruct the cell–cell communications among different cell types. This review summarized the computational approaches for analyzing the cell–cell communication based on scRNA-seq data and discussed its applications in carcinogenesis and COVID-19. We believe that this review will accelerate the scRNA-seq data deciphering and facilitate the cell–cell communication studies for complex physiological processes, such as carcinogenesis and SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Keywords

• Cell-cell communication
• Ligand-receptor pair
• Single-cell RNA sequencing
• Carcinogenesis
• COVID-19