Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery, Anhui Provincial Clinical Research Center for Hepatobiliary Diseases, Anhui Province Key Laboratory of Hepatopancreatobiliary Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China.
Transplant and Immunology Laboratory, The First Affiliated Hospital of University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China.
Front Immunol. 2022 Oct 31;13:996721. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2022.996721. eCollection 2022.
Interpreting the mechanisms and principles that govern gene activity and how these genes work according to -their cellular distribution in organisms has profound implications for cancer research. The latest technological advancements, such as imaging-based approaches and next-generation single-cell sequencing technologies, have established a platform for spatial transcriptomics to systematically quantify the expression of all or most genes in the entire tumor microenvironment and explore an array of disease milieus, particularly in tumors. Spatial profiling technologies permit the study of transcriptional activity at the spatial or single-cell level. This multidimensional classification of the transcriptomic and proteomic signatures of tumors, especially the associated immune and stromal cells, facilitates evaluation of tumor heterogeneity, details of the evolutionary trajectory of each tumor, and multifaceted interactions between each tumor cell and its microenvironment. Therefore, spatial profiling technologies may provide abundant and high-resolution information required for the description of clinical-related features in immuno-oncology. From this perspective, the present review will highlight the importance of spatial transcriptomic and spatial proteomics analysis along with the joint use of other sequencing technologies and their implications in cancers and immune-oncology. In the near future, advances in spatial profiling technologies will undoubtedly expand our understanding of tumor biology and highlight possible precision therapeutic targets for cancer patients.
解析基因活性的机制和原理，以及这些基因根据其在生物中的细胞分布如何发挥作用，对癌症研究具有深远的意义。最新的技术进步，如基于成像的方法和下一代单细胞测序技术，为空间转录组学建立了一个平台，以系统地定量整个肿瘤微环境中所有或大多数基因的表达，并探索一系列疾病环境，特别是在肿瘤中。空间分析技术允许在空间或单细胞水平上研究转录活性。这种肿瘤转录组和蛋白质组特征的多维分类，特别是相关的免疫和基质细胞，有助于评估肿瘤异质性、每个肿瘤的进化轨迹细节以及每个肿瘤细胞与其微环境之间的多方面相互作用。因此，空间分析技术可能为描述免疫肿瘤学中与临床相关的特征提供丰富和高分辨率的信息。从这个角度来看，本综述将强调空间转录组学和空间蛋白质组学分析的重要性，以及与其他测序技术的联合使用及其在癌症和免疫肿瘤学中的意义。在不久的将来，空间分析技术的进步无疑将扩大我们对肿瘤生物学的理解，并为癌症患者突出可能的精准治疗靶点。
