Expanding the horizons for single-cell applications on lab-on-a-chip devices.
Stochastic events in gene expression, protein synthesis, and metabolite synthesis or degradation lead to cellular heterogeneity essential to life. In a tissue as we see in organs, there is strong heterogeneity among the constituting cells critical to its function. Thus, there exists a strong demand to develop new micro/nanosystems that would enable us to conduct single-cell analysis. This field is rapidly growing, as exemplified below with recent emerging technologies that now reveal sensitive single-cell "omics" analysis. We describe in the review some of the most promising technologies that will certainly transform our view of biology in the near future.
JST-CREST, Institute of Industrial Science, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
Soo Hyeon
SH
Kim
Dominique
D
Fourmy
Teruo
T
Fujii
D000818:Animals; D019295:Computational Biology / Q000295:instrumentation; D004867:Equipment Design; D006801:Humans; D056656:Lab-On-A-Chip Devices; D059010:Single-Cell Analysis / Q000295:instrumentation*