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HT-smFISH: a cost-effective and flexible workflow for high-throughput single-molecule RNA imaging

Nature Protocols volume 18, pages 157–187 (2023)Cite this article

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Abstract

The ability to visualize RNA in its native subcellular environment by using single-molecule fluorescence in situ hybridization (smFISH) has reshaped our understanding of gene expression and cellular functions. A major hindrance of smFISH is the difficulty to perform systematic experiments in medium- or high-throughput formats, principally because of the high cost of generating the individual fluorescent probe sets. Here, we present high-throughput smFISH (HT-smFISH), a simple and cost-efficient method for imaging hundreds to thousands of single endogenous RNA molecules in 96-well plates. HT-smFISH uses RNA probes transcribed in vitro from a large pool of unlabeled oligonucleotides. This allows the generation of individual probes for many RNA species, replacing commercial DNA probe sets. HT-smFISH thus reduces costs per targeted RNA compared with many smFISH methods and is easily scalable and flexible in design. We provide a protocol that combines oligo pool design, probe set generation, optimized hybridization conditions and guidelines for image acquisition and analysis. The pipeline requires knowledge of standard molecular biology tools, cell culture and fluorescence microscopy. It is achievable in ~20 d. In brief, HT-smFISH is tailored for medium- to high-throughput screens that image RNAs at single-molecule sensitivity.

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Fig. 1: Overview of the HT-smFISH pipeline.
Fig. 2: Oligo pool design.
Fig. 3: RNA probe set generation from an oligo pool.
Fig. 4: In situ hybridization and imaging.
Fig. 5: HT-smFISH images highlighting the localization of mRNAs to various subcellular locations.
Fig. 6: HT-smFISH probe sets hybridized in mouse colon tissue sections and primary neurons.
Fig. 7: Images of negative and positive control wells routinely included in HT-smFISH experiments.
Fig. 8: Examples of capillary gel electrophoresis used to quality control various steps during probe set generation.

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Data availability

The main data discussed in this protocol were generated as part of the studies published in the supporting primary research papers6,13. Example barcodes, barcode primers and probe sets are provided in Supplementary Tables 1 and 2.

Code availability

Oligostan-HT is available at https://hub.docker.com/r/oligostan/oligostan_ht_rna alongside documentation and test data. FISH-quant v2 for image analysis is available at https://github.com/fish-quant.

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Acknowledgements

A.S. was supported by the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR, grant no. ANR 19-CE12-0024-01) and fellowships from the Ministère de l’Enseignement Supérieur, de la Recherche et de l’Innovation (MESRI) and the Fondation pour la Recherche Médicale (FRM). This project was supported by France BioImaging (ANR-10-INBS-04), the ANR (grants ANR-11-BSV8-018-02 and ANR-14-CE10-0018-01), the FRM ‘Bioinformatics’ grant, the Pasteur Institut, the Ligue Nationale Contre le Cancer and the Labex EpiGenMed from the framework ‘Investissements d’avenir.’

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut de Génétique Moléculaire de Montpellier, University of Montpellier, CNRS, Montpellier, France

    Adham Safieddine, Emeline Coleno, Abdel-Meneem Traboulsi, Soha Salloum, Charles-Henri Lecellier, Thierry Gostan, Marion Peter & Edouard Bertrand

  2. Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Institut de Biologie Paris-Seine, Laboratoire de Biologie du Développement, Paris, France

    Adham Safieddine

  3. Institut de Génétique Humaine, University of Montpellier, CNRS, Montpellier, France

    Emeline Coleno, Soha Salloum & Edouard Bertrand

  4. BioCampus Montpellier, Montpellier, Cedex, France

    Frederic Lionneton, Virginie Georget & Cédric Hassen-Khodja

  5. LIRMM, University of Montpellier, CNRS, Montpellier, France

    Charles-Henri Lecellier

  6. Centre for Computational Biology (CBIO), Mines Paris, PSL University, Paris, France

    Arthur Imbert & Thomas Walter

  7. Institut Curie, PSL University, Paris, France

    Arthur Imbert & Thomas Walter

  8. INSERM, U900, 75005, Paris, France

    Arthur Imbert & Thomas Walter

  9. Institut Pasteur, Université de Paris, Computational Imaging and Modeling Unit, F-75015, Paris, France

    Florian Mueller

  10. Institut de Recherche en Cancérologie de Montpellier U1194, University of Montpellier, INSERM, ICM, CNRS, Montpellier, France

    Marion Peter

  11. Equipe Labélisée Ligue Nationale Contre le Cancer, University of Montpellier, CNRS, Montpellier, France

    Edouard Bertrand

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Contributions

The HT-smFISH methodology was conceived by E.B. and developed by A.M-T., C.H.-K., C.-H.L., E.B., E.C., F.L., M.P., T.G. and V.G. Oligostan-HT was developed by T.G. with input from E.B., and C.-H.L. for barcoding and target selection. The RNA localization analysis pipeline FISH-quant v2 was developed by A.I., F.M. and T.W. S.S. performed experiments in tissue. A.S. wrote the manuscript with input from E.B. A.S. made the figures. All authors reviewed the manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Adham Safieddine or Edouard Bertrand.

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Nature Protocols thanks Mona Batish and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Key references using this protocol

Safieddine, A. et al. Nat. Commun. 12, 1352 (2021): https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-21585-7

Kwon, O. S. et al. Nat. Commun. 12, 1351 (2021): https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-21590-w

Supplementary information

Reporting Summary

Supplementary Table 1

Barcodes and PCR barcode primers to be ordered. The primers are organized by plate and ID. Oligostan-HT uses this order such that the first two primers of plate 1 (wells A1 and A2) are used to PCR the first probe set in the Oligostan-HT output file, the next two (wells A3 and A4) for the second probe set, and so on.

Supplementary Table 2

A sample of Oligostan-HT’s output. The output is shown in an Excel sheet with several columns. ENST, ensemble transcript identifier; ENSGx, ensemble gene identifier; GeneName, name of gene or RNA; SET, the experiment to which the probe set belongs; dGOpt, ΔG37°C reference value (yielding the highest number of probes); Start/End Pos, the start and end position of the probe with respect to the target transcript’s coding sequence; ProbeSize, the length of the probe’s hybridization sequence; Seq, the probe’s hybridization sequence; dGScore and dG37, ΔG37°C score (higher is better) and value; GCpc, percentage of GC in the hybridization sequence; GCFilter, whether the probe satisfies the specified % GC filter; aCompFilter, whether the probe contains an A nucleotide composition <28%; aStackFilter, whether the probe does not contain AAAA stacks; cCompFilter, whether the probe contains an C nucleotide composition between 22% and 28%, cStackFilter, whether the probe does not contain CCCC stacks; cSpecStackFilter, whether the probe does not contain four nonconsecutive Cs in any six consecutive nucleotides in the first twelve positions; NbOfPNAS, the number of filters satisfied (from ref. 55); PNASFilter, whether the probe satisfies the assigned number of PNAS filters; RSESeqFilter, whether probes contain a restriction enzyme site, filter not used; InsideUTR, whether the probe is inside a UTR; BC1ID, ID of the first barcode to be used to amplify the probe; BC1PN, the number of the plate in which the barcode is stored; BC1WP, position of the barcode in the 96-well plate; BC1, sequence of barcode 1; BC2ID, BC2PN, BC2WP, BC2, same as barcode 1, but for barcode 2; BC1-Y-Hyb-X-BC2, sequence resulting from concatenation of barcode 1– readout Y–hybridization sequence–readout X–barcode 2; WithComplementSeq, same but with a few additional nucleotides to normalize all oligonucleotide length to facilitate synthesis. This column has the oligo pool sequences to be ordered.

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Safieddine, A., Coleno, E., Lionneton, F. et al. HT-smFISH: a cost-effective and flexible workflow for high-throughput single-molecule RNA imaging. Nat Protoc 18, 157–187 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41596-022-00750-2

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