Sanja Vicković has received a $2.68 million NIH R01 award from the National Human Genome Research Institute for the project “NextGen Spatial Multi-omics Technologies” (Award Number R01HG014032).
The project will develop a cost-effective and user-friendly platform for spatial multi-omic profiling, addressing both the technical complexity and high cost of currently available spatial technologies. The proposed platform will include nucleic acid capture surfaces that encode spatial information at one-micron resolution, an all-sequencing-based method for spatially resolved multi-omic profiling, and a new PCR-free approach called spatial inference via localized concatemerization, or SILC.
Together, these technologies will enable integrated measurements of gene expression and chromatin state while preserving the spatial organization of cells within tissues. By reducing reliance on expensive consumables, specialized imaging equipment, and complex workflows, the project aims to make spatial multi-omic profiling accessible to a much broader research community.
