Advances in Spatial Transcriptomics in Bone

TL;DR

This review discusses how spatial transcriptomics can reveal gene activity in bone's microenvironment, offering new insights into skeletal biology and disease.

Contribution

The paper highlights recent advancements in spatial transcriptomics for bone research and emphasizes its potential for multi-omics integration.

Findings

Spatial transcriptomics is now applicable to bone thanks to improved sample preparation.

Standardized analysis pipelines and larger sample sizes are needed for better interpretability.

The technology is positioned as key for understanding bone complexity and advancing orthopaedic research.

Abstract

Spatial transcriptomics enables to capture the whole transcriptome within the local microenvironment in bone. Within this review, we provide an overview of recent spatial transcriptomics applications and indicate its potential for advancing basic and translational research in skeletal development and maintenance, bone-related disorders, as well as fracture healing.

Recent developments in sample preparation protocols have enabled the application of spatial transcriptomics to bone. However, there is a lack of standardized data analyses pipelines for spatial transcriptomics in bone. The interpretability of current data sets further suffers from low sample sizes.

We consider spatial transcriptomics a cornerstone technology for unravelling bone’s spatial and molecular complexity. Via integration into emerging multi-omics and multi-modal imaging approaches, spatial transcriptomics has the potential to advance translational-targeted research in the fields of orthopaedics and musculoskeletal research.

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