摘要
Understanding the structure and function of life requires the study of its basic constituent unit—cells.Cell bio-function depends largely on the coordinated expression of different genes.Traditional sequencing methods(such as DNA sequencing,and bulk RNA-seq)are performed on cell populations or tissue samples,in which biological differences between cells can be easily obscured by sample averaging and technical noises.Single-cell sequencing,an emerging technique in recent years,contributes extensively to understanding biological phenomena and studying the mechanism of diseases.Sequencing the genome of individual cells could reveal gene mutations,while single-cell transcriptome sequencing helps uncover the expression variability of genes,and most importantly,heterogeneous cells from the same samples.In this review,we will give an overview of the single-cell sequencing technique and its current applications in one of the most popular research fields:neuroscience research.
