The Single-Cell Analysis Revolution

The inability to study and quantify a large number of cells individually has long been a standing problem for medical science. As Prof. Collins points out, this is now rapidly changing:

“Yet, during the long history of biomedical research, scientists have not possessed the technical ability to study individual cells in their normal environment. Instead, they have had to be content with low-resolution technologies that could only analyze millions, or maybe even billions, of cells as a group. With a variety of new technologies invented in the last few years, especially to ascertain (swe: fastställa) what genes are turned on or off in an individual cell, this is all changing.”

— Francis Collins, Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH)

Contrary to what has been possible in the past, novel single-cell analysis techniques like HoloMonitor allow scientists to single out specific cells in their normal environment and gently study their individual behavior. Single-cell analysis techniques together with modern data processing promise to change our understanding of autoimmune diseases and how to combat the deadly process of cancer metastasis, in which a few malignant (swe: elakartade) tumor cells fatally colonize vital organs.

Since their invention, supercomputers have helped meteorologists to understand the complexities of our atmosphere and weather. The accepted capabilities of single-cell analysis techniques, supercomputing and artificial intelligence have evolved to a point where they are ready to help cell biologists untangle the even greater complexities of multicellular organisms — containing trillions of interacting and highly complex cells.

After all, big data supercomputing and artificial intelligence owe its recent success to cell biology, as modern artificial intelligence is based on computer models of how brain cells are believed to communicate.*