This article has been updated to correct pricing information for the Stereo-seq workflow.
NEW YORK – Complete Genomics highlighted efforts to bring multiomics and spatial biology capabilities to its sequencing customers at the American Society of Human Genetics annual meeting last week.
The US subsidiary of Chinese next-generation sequencing instrument maker MGI Tech is already offering products based on Stereo-seq, a spatial transcriptomics technology originally developed by researchers affiliated with BGI Group.
At the meeting, it unveiled Go Spatial, an automated sample processing platform for the Stereo-seq workflow, as well as FluoXpert, which promises to give its DNBSeq-G400 sequencer protein analysis capabilities with a software upgrade.
"Obviously, multiomics is not just the genome," said Rob Tarbox, Complete Genomics' VP of product and marketing. "We want our technology to be able to work with and generate all the kinds of data that our customers want to generate."
Stereo-seq
According to Tarbox, Complete Genomics became the exclusive US distributor of STOmics Tech — a BGI Group subsidiary that has commercialized the Stereo-seq technology — in early July. Despite both being affiliated with BGI, Complete Genomics' relationship with STOmics is "very much a distributorship in every facet," Tarbox said, though he declined to disclose financial details.
Currently, STOmics carries products for analyzing fresh frozen and formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tissue samples. For fresh frozen and FFPE samples, the company offers 1 cm x 1 cm chips, as well as 2 cm x 3 cm chips for fresh frozen samples.
According to a Complete Genomics spokesperson, the per-mm2 cost for the Stereo-seq workflow, including sequencing, is $56 for the first run and $49 for the second run on the smaller chips and $81 for the first and $67 for the second run on the larger chip.
STOmics also offers Stereo-seq Analysis Workflow (SAW) software, a suite of pipelines that enables spatial data analysis, expression quantification, and data visualization.
Compared to existing products in the market, Tarbox said one advantage of Stereo-seq is the large field of view for fresh frozen samples. In addition, the technology employs a non-targeted, species-agnostic, and non-probed-based approach, enabling researchers to achieve hypothesis-free spatial transcriptomics analysis. The technology has also shown to be competitive in an independent benchmarking study.
The company plans to target researchers who hope to study larger tissue samples or organ slices with its fresh frozen products and oncology researchers with its FFPE kit, he said.
Given that Stereo-seq is based on Complete Genomics' DNB-seq technology, Tarbox said, the STOmics products are also "synergistic" with the company's sequencers and could potentially boost instrument sales.
Complete Genomics has also established a spatial certified service provider program for Stereo-seq services. Providers include South Plainfield, NJ-based Admera Health and the Technology Center for Genomics & Bioinformatics (TCGB) of the University of California, Los Angeles, according to its website.
"We hope that over time, as people experience what the technology can do, that will allow them perhaps to either bring it on in their own lab or to maybe push for their local core or shared service group to bring on the technology," Tarbox said.
Meanwhile, it remains somewhat nebulous how STOmics fits in the BGI universe. An STOmics spokesperson noted previously that the company has been "authorized to productize Stereo-seq technology" but turned down interview requests and declined to answer questions before deadline about the company's commercial roadmap, funding, IP, and relationship with BGI Group.
According to STOmics' website, its products are "commercialized by GCATbio," a synthetic biology company based in Changzhou, a city in eastern China. The company similarly declined to clarify its relationship with GCATbio in an email.
GCATbio has a subsidiary in the UK, which was incorporated in March 2023 and previously did business as STOmics UK, according to a UK government website. GCATbio UK lists Jiang Wang, cofounder and chairman of BGI Group, as "a person with significant control" and has appointed Yue Shen, chief scientist of synthetic biology at BGI Research, as a director. GCATbio's US subsidiary, meanwhile, shares the same address as Complete Genomics.
Go Spatial
During the ASHG meeting, Complete Genomics also unveiled Go Spatial, an automation platform developed by MGI for the Stereo-seq workflow. A benchtop instrument, Go Spatial automates crosslinking, tissue fixation, permeabilization, reverse transcription, tissue removal, as well as cDNA release and the collection steps for Stereo-seq. It can process12 samples per 12-hour run, according to the company.
Pricing for Go Spatial is not yet available but it is slated for commercial launch in Q2 of 2025, according to a spokesperson.
"Ever since we got the machine, we never do manual [preparations] again," Joe Yeong Poh Sheng, a spatial immuno-pathologist at Singapore General Hospital who presented at a Complete Genomics-sponsored workshop during ASHG, told GenomeWeb.
Sheng, an early-access customer for Go Spatial, said his lab can process up to 24 slides a day using the platform instead of just four samples per day manually.
FluoXpert
Complete Genomics also showcased FluoXpert, an add-on to the DNB-seq G400 sequencer that enables multiplex immunofluorescence (mIF) staining for protein analysis. "Basically, what we do is take one of our sequencers and use the same optics and fluidic delivery [to] make it a fluorescent imager," Tarbox explained.
The FluoXpert staining module can detect up to 24 protein targets on a single tissue section with an imaging resolution of 360 nm per pixel. The workflow comes with a multiplex immunofluorescence reagent kit that supports both fresh frozen and FFPE samples.
Three flow cells are avialable for FluoXpert: solo small, which supports one sample and has a scanning region of 15 mm x 15 mm; solo large, which comes with a scanning region of 15 mm x 20 mm; and dual large, which can fit two tissue sections, each with a scanning area of 15 mm x 20 mm.
Sheng, who is also an early-access customer for FluoXpert, received the technology in September and has performed a few dozens of runs so far. The workflow is "very easy to use" and the lab can "easily" analyze close to 40 slides a week, he said, with a turnaround time of about 10 hours for a 24-target run. Since FluoXpert generates signals from secondary antibodies, off-the-shelf antibodies can be used, he added.
Existing G400 customers can upgrade to the FluoXpert for an undisclosed price, according to a company spokesperson. While there is no commercial launch date available, Complete Genomics plans to make the technology available to US customers on an early-access basis "very soon," she said.