AstroTarget: a simple kit to pull out rare plaque-associated astrocytes from frozen Alzheimer brain for clean multi-omic profiling
Official title: AstroTarget™ Astro-Enrichment Kit: A Microfluidic-Free Platform for High-Throughput Rare-Astrocyte Isolation and Multi-Omic Profiling from Frozen Alzheimer’s Brain
Funded at Vivid Bioinnovations, Pbc · NIH-11410332 · Data updated 2026-11-12
A new, easy-to-use kit helps researchers isolate a tiny, hard-to-find group of astrocytes in Alzheimer’s brain and study their genes and chromatin with high accuracy.
Quick facts
| Grant type | Sbir 2 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | Vivid Bioinnovations, Pbc NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (San Francisco, UNITED STATES) |
| Project start | September 8, 2026 |
| Project end | August 31, 2027 |
| Funding year | 2026 |
| Award (this year) | $506,495 |
| NIH project number | 1R44AG102286-01 |
| Project ID | NIH-11410332 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Not applicable—this is a lab kit for research using human brain tissue; it does not enroll patients.
✕Less likely to help
No direct patient participation is required for this grant.
What this research studies
This project aims to simplify how scientists enrich rare plaque-associated astrocytes from frozen Alzheimer's brain tissue without microfluidics. It uses bead-anchored labeling and droplet-digital PCR to mark astrocytes expressing specific markers, followed by fast bead-based sorting to enrich these cells more than 50-fold while keeping RNA and ATAC data intact. The plan covers completing the labeling chemistry, validating probe panels, and testing the workflow on degraded samples, with the goal of delivering a ready-to-use kit for high-throughput analysis. If successful, clinicians and researchers could gain clearer insights into how astrocytes contribute to amyloid and tau pathology at the single-cell level.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, patients may benefit in the long term through faster, more precise understanding of Alzheimer’s biology that could guide new therapies.
How similar studies have gone: Previous approaches require expensive sequencing from many nuclei; this project proposes a more cost-effective enrichment method, which is promising but newly demonstrated.
Where this research is happening
-
Vivid Bioinnovations, Pbc
San Francisco, United States Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Prince, Robin — Vivid Bioinnovations, Pbc
- Study coordinator: Prince, Robin
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.