Decoding Lung Cancer at Single-Cell Level

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death due to its high degree of malignancy, rapid growth, and early metastasis. Recent studies have found that lung cancer has a high degree of heterogeneity which is characterized by the mixture of different tumor cell types. However, the driving genetic/epigenetic mechanism of lung cancer heterogeneity, how different types of cells interact, and the relationship between heterogeneity and drug resistance have been poorly understood. Single-cell technology can decompose high throughput sequencing information into each cell and provide single-cell information in high resolution. By using single-cell analysis, researchers can not only fully understand the molecular characteristics of different cell types in the same tissue, but also define completely new cell types. Thus, single-cell analysis has been widely utilized in systems biology, drug discovery, disease diagnosis and precision medicine. We review recent exploration of the mechanism of heterogeneity, tumor microenvironment and drug resistance in lung cancer by using single-cell analysis. We propose that the recent findings may pave new ways for the treatment strategies of lung cancer.