Spatial transcriptomics in autoimmune rheumatic disease: potential clinical applications and perspectives.

Spatial transcriptomics is a cutting-edge technology that analyzes gene expression at the cellular level within tissues while integrating spatial location information. This concept, which combines high-plex RNA sequencing with spatial data, emerged in the early 2010s. Spatial transcriptomics has rapidly expanded with the development of technologies such as in situ hybridization, in situ sequencing, in situ spatial barcoding, and microdissection-based methods.