Advances in single-cell technologies are providing unprecedented opportunities to analyse the complexities of biological systems at exceptional resolutions. They provide means to gain a better understanding of diverse processes such as tumorigenesis, gene expression dynamics and tumour heterogeneity.

In a masterclass organised via Zoom at the beginning of this year, Oncode Investigator Jop Kind (Hubrecht Institute) and 7 other invited speakers (Jake Yeung, Alexander van Oudenaarden, Geert Kops, Floris van den Brekel (all Hubrecht Institute) Luca Braccioli (De Wit; NKI), Miao-Ping Chien and Joost Gribnau (both Erasmus MC)) familiarized attendees with the field of single-cell genomics/epigenomics and its applications, including a virtual tour of the new single cell epigenomics facility.

The high attendance, with a total of 80 participants – indicated a widespread interest in the topic within the community. The participants’ feedback described the event as insightful, offering a great overview of the current state of the art and applications of single-cell technologies, while also facilitating contact when help is needed with this type of experiments. According to the participants, the content also offered a comprehensive insight into the technologies used and developed within the Oncode community.

Especially appreciated were the extended Q&As. Given the digital context of the event, we aimed to push beyond them and bring something of a real-life event context. To do that, we turned lunch and coffee breaks into the change to interact and added three long Q&A sessions in which speakers of the respective session were available for more questioning.

And as ideas foster more ideas, one of the Oncode’s PIs that attended the event and was inspired to organize a workshop. We will keep the mystery for now and tell everything about it soon.