DECONVersation: Single Cell Foundation Model-Derived Embeddings for Robust Cell Type Deconvolution of Bulk RNA-seq

Read the full article See related articles

Listed in

This article is not in any list yet, why not save it to one of your lists.
Log in to save this article

Abstract

Motivation: Bulk RNA-seq deconvolution uses single-cell references to estimate cell type proportions in bulk tissue. Existing methods face challenges with batch effects, subject-level variation, and marker gene selection. We propose a new approach leveraging general-purpose single-cell foundation models. Results: DECONVersation combines pretrained or fine-tuned single-cell foundation model embeddings with non-negative least squares for deconvolution. The embeddings eliminate the need for explicit marker selection, and reduce batch effects. Compared against MuSiC, DWLS, and BayesPrism, DECONVersation with Geneformer or Cell2Sentence-2B achieved competitive performance across six bulk datasets with ground truth, with performance improvements after reference-specific fine-tuning. Availability and Implementation: DECONVersation is available through the Python Package Index. The source code is available at https://github.com/nygenome/DECONVersation, and the datasets and Apptainer/Singularity images are archived on https://zenodo.org/records/22949405.

Article activity feed

  1. Authors published a paper in Biorxiv, they used SciPy in the study. Including #RRIDs will make this less ambiguous. SciScore made a table with this resource, see “Automated Services” module (download as csv, xml or #jats) #RRID #reproducibility

  2. DECONVersation: Single Cell Foundation Model-Derived Embeddings for Robust Cell Type Deconvolution of Bulk RNA-seq #SingleCell 🧪🧬🖥️ https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.02.756356v1

  3. DECONVersation: Single Cell Foundation Model-Derived Embeddings for Robust Cell Type Deconvolution of Bulk RNA-seq https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.02.756356v1

  4. DECONVersation: Single Cell Foundation Model-Derived Embeddings for Robust Cell Type Deconvolution of Bulk RNA-seq https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.02.756356v1