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Neuroscience

Linking connectome with transcriptome using a self-inactivating rabies virus

Nature Methods volume 20, pages 493–494 (2023)Cite this article

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A self-inactivating rabies virus tracer allows long-term monitoring and transcriptomic profiling of synaptically connected cells.

Genetically engineered rabies virus is a powerful tool for investigating the structure and function of neural circuits because of its directional trans-synaptic spreading6,7. Most rabies virus tools were derived from the SAD B19 vaccine strain. Their applications have been limited to short-term experiments because of rabies-induced cytotoxicity. Rabies-induced changes in host cell gene expression also complicate molecular identification of the infected cell types within traced neural circuits8. Lee et al. generated a self-inactivating rabies virus (SiR) using the parent strain CVS N2c, ultimately generating the SiR-N2c viral strain5. They report this strain allows long-term circuit mapping owing to reduced cytotoxicity, reduced immune responses and minimal gene expression changes, enabling single-cell transcriptomics of rabies-traced neurons.

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Fig. 1: SiR-N2c rabies virus links connectome with transcriptome.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank the Allen Institute founder, Paul G. Allen, for his vision, encouragement and support.

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  1. Allen Institute for Brain Science, Seattle, WA, USA

    Shenqin Yao & Boaz P. Levi

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  1. Shenqin Yao
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  2. Boaz P. Levi
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Correspondence to Boaz P. Levi.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Yao, S., Levi, B.P. Linking connectome with transcriptome using a self-inactivating rabies virus. Nat Methods 20, 493–494 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41592-023-01803-4

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