Spatially Resolved Single-Cell Genomics & Cell Atlas of the Brain

Xiaowei Zhuang

Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Harvard University

Spatially Resolved Single-Cell Genomics & Cell Atlas of the Brain

Abstract: Cell and tissue functions arise from the coordinated activities of thousands of different genes. Understanding these functions requires imaging at the genome scale, which advances knowledge in many areas of biology, from the regulation of gene expression in cells to the development of cell fate and the organization of cell types in complex tissues. A single-cell genome-scale imaging method, multiplexed error-robust fluorescence in situ hybridization (MERFISH), was developed to enable spatially resolved single-cell transcriptomics, epigenomics, 3D-genomics, and functional genomics. This method allows for single-cell gene-expression profiling in intact tissues, facilitating the identification, spatial mapping, and functional investigation of distinct cell types within those tissues. Using this approach, molecularly defined, spatially resolved, and functionally annotated cell atlases of the brain have been created. This lecture will describe the MERFISH technology and its applications, with a particular focus on mapping the molecular, spatial, and functional organizations of distinct cell types in the brain.

Bio: Xiaowei Zhuang is an investigator for theHoward Hughes Medical Institute and the David B. Arnold Professor of Science at Harvard University. She pioneered the development of super-resolution imaging and genome-scale imaging methods. She invented STORM, a super-resolution imaging method, and discovered novel molecular structures in cells using STORM. She invented MERFISH, a genome-scale imaging and spatial genomics method, and made discoveries in areas ranging from the cellular organization and functions in the brain to the 3D genome organization and gene regulation in cells using MERFISH. Zhuang is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Medicine, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She received many awards, including National Inventors Hall of Fame, Dreyfus Prize in Chemical Sciences, Heinrich Wieland Prize, Lurie Prize in Biomedical Sciences, Vilcek Prize in Biomedical Science, Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences, Pearl Meister Greengard Prize, National Academy of Sciences Award for Scientific Discovery, Heineken Prize for Biochemistry and Biophysics, and MacArthur Fellowship. 

The Neuro's Olszewski Lecture, established in 1986, honours Dr. Jerzy Olszewski (1913–1964), a pioneering neuroanatomist and neuropathologist. Invited to The Neuro by Dr. Wilder Penfield in 1948, Olszewski collaborated on the seminal