Molecular Biology
Every cell has its own individual molecular fingerprint, which is informative for its functions and regulatory states. Researchers have now carried out a comprehensive comparison of methodologies that quantify RNAs of single cells.
17.02.2017
Excerpt from LMU press release of February 17, 2017:
Fingerprinting cell identities
The cell is the fundamental unit of all living organisms. Hence, in order to understand essential biological processes and the perturbations that give rise to disease, one must first dissect the functions of cells and the mechanisms that regulate them. Modern high-throughput protein and nucleic-acid sequencing techniques have become an indispensable component of this endeavor. In particular, single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) permits one to determine the levels of RNA molecules – the gene copies - that are expressed in a given cell, and several versions of the methodology have been described in recent years. The spectrum of genes expressed in a given cell amounts to a molecular fingerprint, which yields a detailed picture of its current functional state. “For this reason, the technology has become an extraordinarily valuable tool, not only for basic research but also for the development of new approaches to treat diseases,” says professor Wolfgang Enard. Enard and his team have now undertaken the first comprehensive comparative analysis of the various RNA sequencing techniques, with regard to their sensitivity, precision and cost efficiency. Their results appear in the leading journal Molecular Cell. Molecular Cell 2017