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Project

Novel droplet-microfluidic solutions for single-cell multiomics.

In the past decades, scientists have studied the genetics of tissues

and organs by taking a tissue sample, breaking all the cells open and

analysing the resulting mix. This approach leads to an averaged-out

signal from all cells in the sample, causing rare cell types to go

unnoticed. Today, it has become more and more evident that these

lost rare cells can play a key role in organ functioning, disease and

development. Luckily, several “single-cell” technologies have recently

emerged, allowing us to analyse every single cell in a sample by its

own. In these techniques, thousands of cells are encapsulated into

tiny water droplets in oil. When the cells are now broken, their

content remains separate from the other cells, and analysis can

occur cell-by-cell. These detailed analyses have caused a revolution

in biology, helping us understand the relationship between genetics,

disease and development. At Aertslab, we are at the frontiers of this

single-cell revolution. My PhD focuses on the development of a new

droplet-based analysis technique which can extract multiple layers of

information from the same cell, something that can only be done at a

very slow pace today. Analysing thousands of cancer or brain cells

using this technique could help us understand the genetic regulation

behind these cells – and where it goes wrong. Solving this complex

and important question will lead to many opportunities for advanced

and personalised medicine.

Date:1 Aug 2019 →  30 Sep 2023
Keywords:single cell, transcriptomics, microfluidics, sequencing, hydrogels, epigenomics
Disciplines:Computational transcriptomics and epigenomics, Epigenomics, Transcriptomics, Microfluidics/flow chemistry
Project type:PhD project