Next-generation RNA sequencing of spatially mapped material from human body donors for testing the impact of fetal environments on the liver transcriptome

The left sided segments of the prenatal liver receive blood enriched with oxygen and nutrients, while the right ones receive blood with low levels of oxygen and nutrients. We aimed at testing whether this affects the postnatal transcriptome of cells populating different liver segments and to explore the suitability of body donor material for transcriptomic analysis. 72 biopsies were harvested from 6 liver segments (LS) of 4 human body donors within the first 10 h post-mortem. RNA was extracted and prepared for next-generation RNA sequencing. Additionally, 14 datasets from a tissue bank were examined for comparison. DV200 and RIN values confirmed that < 10 h post-mortem liver samples are suitable for transcriptomic analysis. The transcriptome was comparable across all liver segments, individuals, and tissue bank samples. The expression profile of LS2 of the body donor livers appeared to slightly differ from that of the other segments. Our study demonstrates that liver material from body donors harvested < 10 h post-mortem is suitable for transcriptomics. LS2 showed a slightly distinct expression pattern, which we speculate may be influenced by the peculiar blood supply to the fetal liver, although the influence of other factors, such as sample quality and composition cannot be excluded.