A cellular anatomy of normal adult human female urethra

Single cell RNA sequencing was performed on young adult human female urethra with in situ validation of putative cell types. The proximal urethra and dorsal ducts were shown to contain a transitional epithelium with basal, intermediate and luminal layers as well as rare neuroendocrine epithelia.

Squamous epithelium was predominantly found in the distal urethra. Novel fibroblast subtypes were validated in situ as displaying regional localization with insight into putative functions. Finally, a comparison of male prostatic urethra and female urethra was performed using both single cell and spatial transcriptomics.