Scale Biosciences Unveils New Single Cell Sequencing Products

Scale Biosciences, Inc. announced an expansion of their product portfolio to enable a broader range of single cell omics experiments and unlock new translational research applications. New products include the ScaleBio Single Cell Methylation Kit, ScaleBio Single Cell CRISPR Guide Enrichment Kit, Scale-plex Kit, and additional capabilities for the company’s existing ScaleBio Single Cell RNA Sequencing Kit to facilitate more diverse experimental designs and broader use of translational samples leveraging innovative, scalable, and accessible tools to democratize single cell omics across research applications without the need for additional instrumentation. Together, these kit-based products expand researchers' ability to profile cells and tissues, and to uncover novel cell types and states with their functions. 

“Our new offerings are a down payment on our commitment to democratizing single cell omics through innovations designed to redefine what’s possible across cell types, sample throughput, and modalities of study,” said Giovanna Prout, chief executive officer at ScaleBio. “We look forward to our continued partnership with the research community which helps us identify the best ways to apply our technologies to design products that overcome technological limitations and address market gaps.” 

ScaleBio is the first single cell omics company to offer its customers a complete kitted solution for high-throughput single cell methylation sequencing. Building on the foundational work of academic researchers, ScaleBio built the ScaleBio Single Cell Methylation Sequencing Kit to enable broader access to single cell methylation tools. The kit uses a simple, instrument-free, plate-based indexing workflow leveraging ScaleBio’s patented combinatorial indexing technology, to enable projects profiling tens of thousands of cells. The company is also offering this solution as a service and is currently accepting new projects. 

Researchers across oncology, neuroscience, and other epigenetics applications can use this solution to prepare sequencing-ready libraries from a wide range of fresh and frozen sample types across species, powering new understandings of the relationship between the genome and cellular function. “The research community needs a robust solution to scale single cell methylation analysis and help unlock new understandings of the relationship between genomics, epigenetics and human health,” said Andrew Adey, PhD, professor of molecular and medical genetics at Oregon Health & Science University. “I’m pleased to see the team at ScaleBio expand upon my research and offer the community a kitted solution that enables simultaneous detection of DNA, and methylation status at the single cell level.” 

ScaleBio also unveiled new single cell RNA-sequencing kits and capabilities designed to address the inherent limitations of existing single cell genomics tools and to allow its customers to achieve broader flexibility and more robust data from their cell atlases. New kits and capabilities include:

·       ScaleBio Single Cell CRISPR Guide Enrichment Kit – This new kit unlocks single cell CRISPR screening applications, further improving single cell CRISPR guide detection with commonly used CROP-seq libraries. The kit supports pharmaceutical drug discovery applications including target and hit validation, as well as disease research applications.

·       Scale-plex Kit – This kit offers a new sample multiplexing chemistry to enable translational researchers to conduct single cell RNA sequencing experiments using small tissue samples such as core needle biopsies, fine needle aspirates, and small tissue biopsies, that would otherwise be incompatible with this application. Leveraging ScaleBio’s combinatorial indexing technology and this new chemistry, researchers can pool samples while maintaining sample identity, limit individual sample loss and lessen time spent on sample and library preparation.

·       Extended throughput capabilities – This addition to the ScaleBio Single Cell RNA Sequencing kit allows customers doing any type of single cell RNA sequencing-based research to dramatically scale up their experiments from 125,000 cells to up to 500,000 cells per run, while still using ScaleBio’s instrument-free, single cell sequencing workflow. 

“These new solutions show the broad applicability of ScaleBio’s single cell sequencing and combinatorial indexing technology to address a range of research questions, but more importantly, they are a testament to our company’s focus on addressing the shortcomings of existing single cell genomics solutions in an accessible, scalable and cost-effective way,” said Frank Steemers, PhD, cofounder and chief scientific officer at Scale Biosciences. “We look forward to sharing our impressive product performance data at upcoming scientific meetings including American Society of Human Genetics, and continuing to partner with industry leaders to develop more cutting-edge products that expand the universe of what’s possible with single cell genomics.”