Molecular Profiling of Glioblastoma Patient-Derived Single Cells Using Combined MALDI-MSI and MALDI-IHC.

In recent years, mass spectrometry-based imaging techniques have improved at unprecedented speeds, particularly in spatial resolution, and matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI) mass spectrometry imaging (MSI) experiments can now routinely image molecular profiles of single cells in an untargeted fashion. With the introduction of MALDI-immunohistochemistry (IHC), multiplexed visualization of targeted proteins in their native tissue location has become accessible and joins the suite of multimodal imaging techniques that help unravel molecular complexities. However, MALDI-IHC has not been validated for use with cell cultures at single-cell level.

Explainable unsupervised anomaly detection for healthcare insurance data.

Background: Waste and fraud are important problems for health insurers to deal with. With the advent of big data, these insurers are looking more and more towards data mining and machine learning methods to help in detecting waste and fraud. However, labeled data is costly and difficult to acquire as it requires expert investigators and known care providers with atypical behavior.

Proximity adjusted centroid mapping for accurate detection of nuclei in dense 3D cell systems.

In the past decade, deep learning algorithms have surpassed the performance of many conventional image segmentation pipelines. Powerful models are now available for segmenting cells and nuclei in diverse 2D image types, but segmentation in 3D cell systems remains challenging due to the high cell density, the heterogenous resolution and contrast across the image volume, and the difficulty in generating reliable and sufficient ground truth data for model training. Reasoning that most image processing applications rely on nuclear segmentation but do not necessarily require an accurate delineation of their shapes, we implemented Proximity Adjusted Centroid MAPping (PAC-MAP), a 3D U-net based method that predicts the position of nuclear centroids and their proximity to other nuclei.

Simple generation of cleavable labels for multiplexed imaging.

The most common methods for multiplexed immunohistochemistry rely on cyclic procedures, whereby cells or tissues are repeatedly stained, imaged, and regenerated. Here, we present a simple and inexpensive approach for amine-targeted labeling of antibodies using a linker that can be easily cleaved by a mild reducing agent. This method requires only inexpensive and readily-available reagents, and can be carried out without synthetic experience in a simple one-pot reaction.

Trial watch: anticancer vaccination with dendritic cells.

Dendritic cells (DCs) are critical players at the intersection of innate and adaptive immunity, making them ideal candidates for anticancer vaccine development. DC-based immunotherapies typically involve isolating patient-derived DCs, pulsing them with tumor-associated antigens (TAAs) or tumor-specific antigens (TSAs), and utilizing maturation cocktails to ensure their effective activation. These matured DCs are then reinfused to elicit tumor-specific T-cell responses.