TOGGLE delineates fate and function within individual cell types via single cell transcriptomics

Functional RNA plays a crucial role in regulating cellular processes throughout the life cycle of a cell. Identifying functional changes at each stage-from inception to development to maturation, functional execution, and eventual death or pathological transformation-often requires systematic comparisons of functional expression across cell populations. However, because cells of the same type often exhibit similar gene expression patterns regardless of function or fate, it is challenging to distinguish the stages of cellular fate or functional states within the same cell type, which also limits our understanding of cellular memory. Cells of the same type that share structural and gene expression similarities but originate from different regions and perform slightly distinct functions often retain unique epigenetic memory signatures. Although RNA serves as a key executor of fundamental cellular functions, its high expression similarity among cells of the same type limits its ability to distinguish functional heterogeneity. To overcome this challenge, we developed TOGGLE, utilizing higher-resolution analytical methods to uncover functional diversity at the cellular level. Then we based on TOGGLE developed an innovative Graph Diffusion Functional Map, which can significantly reduce noise, thereby more clearly displaying the functional grouping of RNA and enabling the capture of more subtle functional differences in high-dimensional data. Ultimately, this method effectively removes the influence of baseline functions from classification criteria and identifies key trajectories of cell fate determination.

Chen's guidance comes from Dr. Alex P. Carll. Another mentor is Dr. Lu Cai, one of the contributors to the standardization of autophagy detection methods, whose research on criteria for identifying diabetes induced apoptosis has been included in numerous clinical guidelines.