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Sequencing individual cells in a sample enables scientists to infer the unique characteristics of important subsets. Single-cell sequencing methods that rely on microfluidics for cell barcoding are limited in speed, scale and flexibility. We developed a technique that uses particle-templated emulsification instead of microfluidics and can process millions of cells within minutes.
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References
Klein, A. M. et al. Droplet barcoding for single-cell transcriptomics applied to embryonic stem cells. Cell 161, 1187–1201 (2015). A research article presenting a high-throughput single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) technique that utilizes custom droplet-based microfluidics and in-droplet reverse transcription.
Macosko, E. Z. et al. Highly parallel genome-wide expression profiling of individual cells using nanoliter droplets. Cell 161, 1202–1214 (2015). A research article presenting a high-throughput scRNA-seq technique that utilizes custom droplet-based microfluidics and bulk reverse transcription.
Zheng, G. X. et al. Massively parallel digital transcriptional profiling of single cells. Nat. Commun. 8, 14049 (2017). A research article that describes the 10x Genomics commercial scRNA-seq system.
Rosenberg, A. B. et al. Single-cell profiling of the developing mouse brain and spinal cord with split-pool barcoding. Science 360, 176–182 (2018). A research article that describes SPLiT-seq, a method that barcodes cellular RNA using a split pool directly on cells.
Stoeckius, M. et al. Simultaneous epitope and transcriptome measurement in single cells. Nat. Methods 14, 865–868 (2017). An article describing the CITE-seq method.
Hatori, M. N., Kim, S. C. & Abate, A. R. Particle-templated emulsification for microfluidics-free digital biology. Anal. Chem. 90, 9813–9820 (2018). A research article that demonstrates microfluidics-free monodispersed droplet generation with a vortexer.
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This is a summary of: Clark, I. C. et al. Microfluidics-free single-cell genomics with templated emulsification. Nat. Biotechnol. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41587-023-01685-z (2023)
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The next generation of single-cell sequencing methods can be microfluidics-free.
Nat Biotechnol (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41587-023-01710-1
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41587-023-01710-1
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