Single-cell RNA sequencing can detect underlying genetic abnormalities in the cells of diseased organs, according to a recent study that provides a pathway for improving the outcomes of typical clinical biopsies and determining the most effective precision treatments.
The study was published in Nature Immunology on May 20 and led by researchers from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City. In it, scientists used scRNA-seq to test tiny amounts of tissue taken from kidney biopsies of lupus patients.
Not only were the samples much smaller than those typically required for a biopsy, but they also revealed even more information about the genetic makeup of each patient's lupus and helped predict how they would respond to certain treatments. The researchers also found that similar results were achieved when scRNA-seq was used on skin and tubule cells, implying that invasive kidney biopsies could one day be obsolete.
"While our study focused on the kidney, we're optimistic that scRNA-seq can potentially be similarly employed to improve on results obtained from many other types of clinical biopsies, such as those done on the prostate, breast, and skin," said Chaim Putterman, MD, an author of the paper and chief of rheumatology at Einstein.
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