Lab on a Chip Blog

We are pleased to announce the latest Thematic Collection in Lab on a Chip – Droplet-Based Single-Cell Sequencing!

We are delighted that Lab on a Chip Advisory Board member David A Weitz (Harvard University, USA) is Thought Leader of this collection!

The field of droplet-based single-cell sequencing field has made increasing advances in recent years. Large numbers of studies are underway to collect and explore the new information that is now accessible with single-cell RNA-seq. Improvements to microfluidics are advancing rapidly and extensions to other sequencing methods are also being developed, enabling investigations to probe information beyond mRNA alone. This has rapidly become a burgeoning field, where microfluidic techniques are essential and where droplet-based microfluidics has enabled a major advance.

For more context, please read the editorials “Perspective on droplet-based-single cell sequencing” by David Weitz and “InDrops and Drop-seq technologies for single-cell sequencing” by Allon Klein and Evan Macosko.

The goal of this collection is to highlight the new advances in this growing field, with an emphasis on the interface between the technological advancements and high impact applications of droplet-based single-cell sequencing.

Read articles included in the collection so far at rsc.li/drop-sc-seq

Interested in submitting to the collection?

If you are interested in contributing to the droplet-based single-cell sequencing collection, please get in touch with the Lab on a Chip Editorial Office at loc-rsc@rsc.org and provide a title and abstract of your proposed submission.

Articles will be published as they are accepted and collated into an online Thematic Collection, which will receive extensive promotion.

Submissions for this collection are open from 15th July 2017 to 30th April 2018 

We are pleased to announce Lab on a Chip‘s first Thematic Collection in 2017, Organ-, Body- and Disease-on-a-Chip!

We are delighted to announce that Michael Shuler (Cornell University, USA) will be acting as Thought Leader for this collection. His research focuses on “Body-on-a-Chip” devices applied to evaluate different treatments for cancer, such as multi-drug resistant cancer. Read Michael Shuler’s recent Editorial for more information.

An emerging area of interest for drug development over the last 13 years has been constructing human biomimetic systems by combining the techniques of microfabrication and tissue engineering. In this collection, we define an “Organ-on-a-Chip” as a physical microscale model (typically an order of 10⁻⁶ to 10⁻⁴ of actual size) of a particular human organ.

The questions we aim to address in this collection are whether these emerging technologies will improve both drug development and the regulation of human exposure to chemicals. What technical challenges remain? What will be the most effective way to utilize this emerging technology? Can this technology lead to cost effective, measurable improvements in human health? Our goal is to highlight the new advances in this growing field with an emphasis on the interface between the technological advancements and high impact applications of organ-, body- and disease-on-a-chip technologies.

Interested in submitting to the collection? 

We have recently launched a second collection highlighting efforts to translate this concept into practice. A series of papers that address aspects of the issues involved in moving from “proof-of-principle” devices to systems that can be routinely incorporated into testing of drugs, cosmetics, food ingredients, and chemicals would be valuable to the development of the field of microphysiological systems. We seek contributions that will help us fulfill this goal. More information can be found on the updated blog.  

We welcome submissions of original research articles and reviews to this collection and the collection is open for submissions. 

If you are interested in submitting to the series, please get in touch with the Lab on a Chip Editorial Office at loc-rsc@rsc.org.