Quartz-Seq: a highly reproducible and sensitive single-cell RNA-Seq reveals non-genetic gene expression heterogeneity

A highly reproducible and sensitive single-cell RNA-Seq method will facilitate the understanding of the biological roles and underlying mechanisms of the non-genetic cellular heterogeneity. In this study, we report a novel single-cell RNA-Seq method called Quartz-Seq that has a simpler protocol and higher reproducibility and sensitivity compared to previously developed methods. We demonstrate that single-cell Quartz-Seq quantitatively detects various kind of non-genetic cellular heterogeneity. The method detects different cell types and different cell-cycle phases of a single-cell type. Moreover, this method can comprehensively reveal gene expression heterogeneity between single-cells of the same cell type at the same cell-cycle phase.