Biomolecular phenotyping and heterogeneity assessment of mesenchymal stromal cells using label-free Raman spectroscopy

Abstract Easy, quantitative measures of biomolecular heterogeneity and high-stratified phenotyping are needed to identify and characterise complex disease processes at the single-cell level, as well as to predict cell fate. Here, we demonstrate how Raman spectroscopy can be used in the difficult-to-...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: R. A. Rocha, J. M. Fox, P. G. Genever, Y. Hancock
Format: article
Language:EN
Published: Nature Portfolio 2021
Subjects:
R
Q
Online Access:https://doaj.org/article/3decc8af6a5f46b288f59e860729de2f
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Summary:Abstract Easy, quantitative measures of biomolecular heterogeneity and high-stratified phenotyping are needed to identify and characterise complex disease processes at the single-cell level, as well as to predict cell fate. Here, we demonstrate how Raman spectroscopy can be used in the difficult-to-assess case of clonal, bone-derived mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs) to identify MSC lines and group these according to biological function (e.g., differentiation capacity). Biomolecular stratification is achieved using high-precision measures obtained from representative statistical sampling that also enable quantified heterogeneity assessment. Application to primary MSCs and human dermal fibroblasts shows use of these measures as a label-free assay to classify cell sub-types within complex heterogeneous cell populations, thus demonstrating the potential for therapeutic translation, and broad application to the phenotypic characterisation of other cells.