This technology is a metagenomics platform for high-resolution spatial analysis of microbial communities that can be used to identify the composition and spatial organization of environmental and human microbiota.
Microbe-microbe interactions are dependent on their spatial organization. Current methods to characterize microbial communities, including fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) and Drop-seq single cell RNA-sequencing, probe only a limited number of species and do not preserve community spatial structure, respectively. Although current tissue clearing methods allow 3D fluorescence imaging and antibody staining of whole tissues, such technologies do not enable deep sequencing.
This technology uncovers the spatial structure of microbial communities by leveraging barcoded metagenomic sequencing. The community spatial structure of the microbial sample is first preserved by impregnation with a polymerized matrix and subsequently fractured into clusters. Clusters are encapsulated in microdroplets and then barcoded for next-generation sequencing. Statistical analyses of enriched microbial pairs can then be used to reveal the spatial interactions of microbes in the microbiome.
This technology has been successfully applied to study spatial interactions in the mouse microbiome.
IR CU16351
Licensing Contact: Cynthia Lang