A team of researchers from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Yale University School of Medicine has created the first “multiome” atlas of brain cell development in the human cerebral cortex across six broad developmental time points from fetal development into adulthood, shedding new light on their roles during brain development and disease.
As described in Science Advances, the researchers used new scientific tools to analyze and describe two kinds of information from each cell—gene expression (transcriptome) as well as DNA structure (epigenome)—enabling them to categorize cell types at different developmental stages. The data revealed specific changes in the structure of chromatin that precede gene expression. These changes are crucial for numerous processes, including the formation of neurons.