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. 2025 May 16;13:54. doi: 10.1038/s41413-025-00429-w

Table 2.

Sequencing-Based ST Technologies

Method Inventor Year established Sample type Advantages Limitations Gene detection efficiency Targeted/ transcriptome-wide Spatial resolution Commercial platform (vendor) References
ROI-selection-based
LCM Emmert-Buck et al. 1996 FF/FFPE Highly suitable for FFPE, whole transcriptome analysis, high spatial resolution Time-consuming, low throughput NA Targeted or transcriptome-wide Cellular LCM(Arcturus, PALM, Leica) 60
Geo-seq Chen et al. 2017 FF Robust, more sensitive than LCM Low throughput, difficult to achieve single-cell spatial resolution NA transcriptome-wide Multicellular NA 24
GeoMx DSP NanoString 2019 FF/FFPE Multiplexing, suitable for FFPE samples, capable of combining multi-omics detection Limited sensitivity NA transcriptome-widea Variable, minimum up to 10 μm GeoMx DSP (NanoString) 61
Spatial barcode-based
Visium 10× Genomics 2019 FF/FFPE Unbiased whole transcriptome analysis, adaptable to FFPE tissues Limited RNA capture efficiency, limited spatial resolution >6.9% transcriptome-widea 55 μm Visium (10× Genomics) 13
Slide-Seq Rodriques et al. 2019 FF Unbiased whole transcriptome analysis, high spatial resolution Not suitable for highly heterogeneous samples, low capture efficiency, in situ sequencing is time-consuming 0.3% transcriptome-wide 10 μm NA 66
DBiT-seq Liu et al. 2020 FF/FFPE Unbiased whole transcriptome analysis, variable spatial resolution, suitable for FFPE tissues, detection of RNA and proteins in a spatial context Limited spatial resolution ~15.5% transcriptome-wide Variable (10 μm, 25 μm, 50 μm) NA 68
Slide-seqV2 Stickels et al. 2021 FF Unbiased whole transcriptome analysis, high spatial resolution, improved capture efficiency Capture efficiency remains low Approximately 10 times higher than Slide-seq transcriptome-wide 10 μm Curio Seeker (Curio Biosciences) 67
Stereo-seq BGI Genomics 2021 FF/FFPE Unbiased whole transcriptome analysis, very high spatial resolution, large detection area Capture efficiency remains low Comparable to Visium transcriptome-wide 220 nm STOmics Stereo-seq, Stereo-seq OMNI (BGI Genomics) 28,38,228
XYZeq Lee et al. 2021 FF Unbiased whole transcriptome analysis, true single-cell resolution Limited spatial resolution NA transcriptome-wide 500 μm (spot-to-spot center distance) NA 70
sci-Space Srivatsan et al. 2021 FF Unbiased whole transcriptome analysis, true single-cell resolution Limited spatial resolution NA transcriptome-wide ~222 μm (spot-to-spot center distance) NA 71
xDBiT Wirth et al. 2023 FF/FFPE Unbiased whole transcriptome analysis, improved gene detection efficiency and throughput compared to DBiT-seq Limited spatial resolution Higher than DBiT-seq transcriptome-wide 50 μm NA 69
Visium HD 10×Genomics 2024 FFPE Using about 18 000 probes for near-whole transcriptome level analysis, no gaps in capture area Only compatible with human and mouse FFPE tissues NA transcriptome-widea 2 μm Visium HD (10× Genomics) 229

aNear-complete transcriptome coverage can only be achieved in human/mouse samples or evolutionarily similar species