Genome Technology Development

Genome Technology Development (GenTechDev) is an open lab that supports the co-development of single cell omics methods, with a particular focus on spatial omics. Our aim is to enable flexibility, scalability and cost efficiency and facilitate custom development of multi-omic spatial profiling in cells, tissues and organisms.

Single-cell omics technologies have led to revolutionary changes in the way in which we can integrate complex biological systems, dramatically expanding our knowledge on cellular heterogeneity, discovering new cell states and uncovering how cells respond to genetic and environmental changes. These properties, often masked in bulk studies, are essential to understand how complex systems function and dynamically change in response to diverse stimuli. While first generation single-cell methods required dissociating the sample, more recent spatial methods enable measuring molecular signatures within intact tissues and organisms. Such spatial-omics methods thereby retain information on three-dimensional cell-to-cell relationships, having an enormous potential to understand the impact of inductive signals and drug responses in both development and disease.

GenTechDev is a joint initiative between the Genome Biology Unit and Scientific Services to enable and support omics technology development at EMBL, and as such it differs conceptually from a core facility. GenTechDev sits between the research groups and core facilities, where it operates as an open lab to co-develop methods. EMBL scientists work with the GenTechDev lab to jointly develop new methods, availing of the expertise of the team, and/or to learn already established methods.

Partnerships

MULTISPACE

Health & Life Science Alliance

Heidelberg Mannheim

EMBL-GSK Collaboration

Spatial Omics Technology Development