Specific cell types and their organization are closely related to biological activities, making the analysis of spatial information of cells crucial for understanding cell biology, developmental biology, neurobiology, and tumor biology. However, at present, little is known about the spatial information of cells at the scale of entire tissues and organisms.
To address this, Yanxiang Deng focused on developing new spatial omics technologies to achieve high spatial resolution mapping of the epigenome, transcriptome, and proteome in tissue sections at the cellular level. In 2020, he developed a novel spatial multi-omics technology (DBiT-seq), which uses a microfluidic platform to deliver molecular barcodes to formaldehyde or FFPE fixed tissue sections, enabling spatially confined 2D barcoding of mRNAs and proteins, thereby constructing high spatial resolution multi-omics maps. This technology enables high spatial resolution mapping of the whole transcriptome and tens of protein markers at the single-cell level, offering higher spatial resolution, high coverage, and multi-omics capability compared to existing methods.
Yanxiang also developed two novel spatial omics technologies, Spatial-CUT&Tag and Spatial-ATAC-seq, which for the first time allowed the observation of epigenetic mechanisms of tissue development at spatial and genome-wide levels, achieving spatial mapping of epigenetic regulation related to development and disease, representing a significant breakthrough in the field of biomedical research.
Spatial omics technologies have already led to a series of new applications, ranging from plant biology to the study of complex interactions within the tumor microenvironment. Notably, in 2020, a company named AtlasXomics Inc. was established to commercialize the spatial omics technologies developed by Yanxiang.
