Last week, the Human Cell Atlas initiative was officially launched. Researchers from all over the world are participating in the program, including scientists from organizations and institutes such as the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, RIKEN, the Karolinska Institute, the Broad Institute and Harvard University. The use of new technologies is key for the initiative, with advances in RNA sequencing and protein structure analysis of a cell to trace its lineage through markers and mutations playing a central role.  The purpose of establishing the cell atlas is to provide researchers with a reference to compare healthy and diseased cells, as well as to support regenerative medicine studies, which involves the regeneration of human cells, tissues or organs. The cell atlas will also result in diagnostic tests, such as complete blood count tests, being more illuminating and informative, as cell types would be identified more accurately; this could result in quicker diagnoses of blood cancers, autoimmunity diseases and infections. Already, new cell types have been found in the brain, gut, retina and immune system, which has provided novel insight into the formation and dynamics of tumors.

Challenges with the initiative include narrowing the scope of the project. First, the project will focus on tissues instead of entire organs, while organs will be researched in later phases. Ultimately, the atlas aims to provide a detailed reference of molecules, cells, tissues, organs and systems in the human body. Obtaining samples through standardized procedures, where consent is provided and the sample is properly filed and tracked, are also extremely important. Members of the initiative also emphasize the necessity of the atlas being an open source initiative, including hosting data and analysis in multiple public clouds (as of now, clouds such as Microsoft, Amazon and Google), and having publications that publicize the data to help establish standardized methods and approaches to the analysis.

Source: Nature