Evidence map›Paper›PMID 40563931›Full record

ArticleBiology2025

scRL: Utilizing Reinforcement Learning to Evaluate Fate Decisions in Single-Cell Data.

Zeyu Fu, Chunlin Chen, Song Wang, Junping Wang, Shilei Chen

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Biology, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
2citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

2 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Review
  2. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Zeyu FuState Key Laboratory of Trauma and Chemical Poisoning, Institute of Combined Injury, Chongqing Engineering Research Center for Nanomedicine, College of Preventive Medicine, Army Medical University, Chongqing 400038, China.ORCID 0009-0001-8329-0108
Chunlin ChenDepartment of Rehabilitation Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China.ORCID 0009-0006-2328-8774
Song WangState Key Laboratory of Trauma and Chemical Poisoning, Institute of Combined Injury, Chongqing Engineering Research Center for Nanomedicine, College of Preventive Medicine, Army Medical University, Chongqing 400038, China.
Junping WangState Key Laboratory of Trauma and Chemical Poisoning, Institute of Combined Injury, Chongqing Engineering Research Center for Nanomedicine, College of Preventive Medicine, Army Medical University, Chongqing 400038, China.
Shilei ChenState Key Laboratory of Trauma and Chemical Poisoning, Institute of Combined Injury, Chongqing Engineering Research Center for Nanomedicine, College of Preventive Medicine, Army Medical University, Chongqing 400038, China.ORCID 0000-0003-3362-2909

Funding

National Natural Science Foundation of China 81602790National Natural Science Foundation of China 81725019National Natural Science Foundation of China 81930090National Natural Science Foundation of China 82073487National Natural Science Foundation of China 82430103
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Single-cell RNA sequencing now profiles whole transcriptomes for hundreds of thousands of cells, yet existing trajectory-inference tools rarely pinpoint where and when fate decisions are made. We present single-cell reinforcement learning (scRL), an actor-critic framework that recasts differentiation as a sequential decision process on an interpretable latent manifold derived with Latent Dirichlet Allocation. The critic learns state-value functions that quantify fate intensity for each cell, while the actor traces optimal developmental routes across the manifold. Benchmarks on hematopoiesis, mouse endocrinogenesis, acute myeloid leukemia, and gene-knockout and irradiation datasets show that scRL surpasses fifteen state-of-the-art methods in five independent evaluation dimensions, recovering early decision states that precede overt lineage commitment and revealing regulators such as

Indexed as

actor–criticdimensionality reductionfate decisionsreinforcement learningsingle–celltrajectory inference

Identifiers

PMID40563931
PMCPMC12189676

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.