Fig. 1: Single-cell RNA sequencing reveals the tumor microenvironment of early-stage and late-stage OSCC. | Nature Communications

Fig. 1: Single-cell RNA sequencing reveals the tumor microenvironment of early-stage and late-stage OSCC.

From: Spatial heterogeneity of MDSCs mediated by ANXA1-FPRs signaling drives immune suppression in OSCC progression

Fig. 1: Single-cell RNA sequencing reveals the tumor microenvironment of early-stage and late-stage OSCC.

a Schematic of the high-throughput single-cell transcriptome analysis workflow for tissues collected from early-stage and late-stage OSCC. Created in BioRender. Li, F. (2026) https://BioRender.com/p0lqjyu. b Representative hematoxylin and eosin (H&E)-stained images of OSCC tumor tissue sections. Scale bar, 1000 μm. c Dimensionality reduction plot visualizing the single-cell RNA-seq data, depicting cell populations within the OSCC microenvironment (n = 102,681 cells). d Dot plot illustrating the expression of key marker genes in corresponding cell types, providing cell type identification (n = 102,681 cells). e Relative abundance of each cell type in early-stage and late-stage OSCC (left panel). Dotplot was generated by foldchange and −log10 (p value) between early-stage (n = 7 biologically independent samples) and late-stage (n = 9 biologically independent samples) OSCC (middle panel). Dimensionality reduction plot was grouped by disease stage (right panel). Significance was calculated by two-sided Student’s t test. Exact p values are provided in the Source Data file. f, g Gene set variation analysis (GSVA) evaluated the enrichment of T cell receptor signaling pathways in CD8+ T cells from early-stage and late-stage OSCC. Fold change referred to the change of the average score (late-stage vs early-stage). Data were shown as mean ± SD. n = 18,815 cells for early-stage and n = 12,226 cells for late-stage. Significance was calculated by two-sided Student’s t test. Exact p values were provided in the Source Data file. h, i GSVA assessed the enrichment of immunosuppressive signaling pathways in myeloid cells during early-stage and late-stage OSCC. Fold change referred to the change of the average score (late-stage vs early-stage). Data were shown as mean ± SD. n = 5210 cells for early-stage and n = 5781 cells for late-stage. Significance was calculated by two-sided Student’s t test. Exact p values were provided in the Source Data file.

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