Spatial Transcriptomics and Protein Detection Using Digital Spatial Profiling (DSP) and Imaging Mass Cytometry (IMC) (SC21)

Course overview

GeoMx Digital Spatial Profiler(DSP) is the newest technology for generating whole transcriptomic data to understand the spatial distribution of the transcripts and to answer the complex underlying biological processes in the tissue microenvironment. Whereas, Imaging Mass Cytometry(IMC) is the robust technology with high resolution imaging capability, which allows single cell level data analysis in frozen or FFPE tissue samples. We combined both technologies to better understand the tissue heterogeneity and underlying molecular signatures of the diseased or the normal tissue types. A multi tissue block was probed with mRNA panel and data was collected using DSP platform to investigate the various transcript level present in the tissue samples. After collecting the transcripts from the slide, we stained the same sample with 30 plus protein markers in a single staining step and ablated it using IMC technology. Combining these two state-of-the-art technologies enables us to capture data both at the transcript and proteomic level without losing the spatial information. The combination of these technologies is a very powerful tool to generate hi-content data to better understand the spatial biology of various disease states.