The paper details the development and application of DBiTplus, an advanced multi-omics platform designed for spatial transcriptomic and proteomic mapping within the same tissue section. This methodology improves upon previous techniques by using microfluidic barcoding and thermostable RNase H to achieve high-quality cDNA recovery while maintaining tissue integrity. Researchers successfully applied this tool to mouse embryos and human lymphoma tissues, enabling the identification of distinct cellular clusters that correspond to specific anatomical regions. By integrating multiplexed immunofluorescence with gene expression data, the study reveals complex biological transitions, such as the transformation of chronic lymphocytic leukemia into more aggressive diffuse large B-cell lymphoma. The findings demonstrate how spatial gradients of immune exhaustion and metabolic reprogramming drive tumor progression. Ultimately, this high-resolution approach provides a robust framework for investigating the molecular architecture of both healthy development and disease states.

References:

• Enninful A, Zhang Z, Klymyshyn D, et al. Integration of imaging-based and sequencing-based spatial omics mapping on the same tissue section via DBiTplus[J]. Nature Methods, 2026: 1-13.