Epigenetic heterogeneity is a fundamental property of biological systems and is recognized as a potential driver of tumor plasticity and therapy resistance. Single-cell epigenomics technologies have been widely employed to study epigenetic variation between—but not within—cellular clusters. We introduce epiCHAOS: a quantitative metric of cell-to-cell heterogeneity, applicable to any single-cell epigenomics data type. After validation in synthetic datasets, we apply epiCHAOS to investigate global and region-specific patterns of epigenetic heterogeneity across diverse biological systems. EpiCHAOS provides an excellent approximation of stemness and plasticity in development and malignancy, making it a valuable addition to single-cell cancer epigenomics analyses.

中文翻译：

---

EpiCHAOS：量化单细胞数据中表观基因组异质性的指标


表观遗传异质性是生物系统的基本特性，被认为是肿瘤可塑性和治疗耐药性的潜在驱动因素。单细胞表观基因组学技术已被广泛用于研究细胞簇之间但不是细胞簇内的表观遗传变异。我们介绍了 epiCHAOS：一种细胞间异质性的定量指标，适用于任何单细胞表观基因组学数据类型。在合成数据集中验证后，我们应用 epiCHAOS 来研究不同生物系统中表观遗传异质性的全局和区域特异性模式。EpiCHAOS 提供了发育和恶性肿瘤中干性和可塑性的出色近似值，使其成为单细胞癌症表观基因组学分析的宝贵补充。