Introduction
Takayasu Arteritis (TA) is a rare, non-specific vascular inflammation
involving large arteries and their main branches. The disorder occurs
worldwide, but is most prevalent in East Asia. In addition, the disease
progresses rapidly after the onset and relapses/recurring cycles of
inflammation affect patient physiology and psychology significantly. Few
symptoms show in the early stage make this disease hardly to be
discovered in time. Physical examination along with imaging and
serological tests is used to assess the extent of inflammation and
progression in TA(1).
The most commonly used drugs for treating TA are glucocorticoids(2),
methotrexate(3), and mycophenolate mofetil(4, 5), however, relapses are
frequent. In recent years, biological agents such as Tocilizumab
(TCZ)(6) and Abatacept (ABA)(7) are being explored as alternative
treatments for TA. Patients with poor response to standard medications
and vascular blockage require surgical intervention involving
endovascular management and open surgical repair (OSR)(8, 9). However,
surgical intervention does not prevent long-term restenosis and new
lesions due to disease
recurrence(10-12). To further
improve the treatment strategy and prognosis of TA patients, research on
its pathogenesis has become the focus of TA-related research.
Recent studies have focus on the significant role of
CD4+ T cell and IL-6 signaling pathway in development
and progression of TA(13-15). Although several groups have studied gene
mutations and protein expression in TA patients. However, the
relationship between these two is rarely mentioned, which is due to the
less data on the types and transcriptomes of peripheral blood cells.
Single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) is a high-throughput technology
based on intracellular transcriptome sequencing to explain the diseases
at the cellular level(16, 17), which give us a chance to find new cell
types and cell functions that have not been discovered before. This new
technology is being widely used in human immune and cardiovascular
diseases(18, 19). In this study, single cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq)
was used to dissect the transcriptomes of peripheral blood mononuclear
cells (PBMCs) in TA patients in order to better understand to this
disease.