Fig. 5

Analysis of cell subpopulation interactions in the testis of Baoshan pigs. (A) The network diagram illustrates the quantity and strength of interactions across the nine cell types. (B) The heatmap depicts overall signal transduction, with cell types on the horizontal axis and pathways on the vertical axis. Outgoing signaling patterns represent signal-sending cell populations, Incoming signaling patterns indicate signal-receiving cell populations. The left panel shows the strength of signal emission for each pathway across different cell types, while the right panel indicates the strength of signal reception for each pathway. The top-colored bar plot displays the aggregated signaling strength of each cell group by summing the contributions of all pathways shown in the heatmap. This helps identify the most active cell groups in the signaling network. The right grey bar plot shows the total pathway-specific signaling strength across all cell groups, highlighting the most influential pathways. (C) The network diagram displays the number of interactions between cell types, where the size of the outer colored circles represents the number of cells, and the more significant the circle represents the greater the number of cells. Cells with outgoing arrows represent ligands, while those with incoming arrows represent receptors. The thickness of the lines connecting ligand-receptor pairs reflects more interactions