The environmental Single Cell Genomics facility

The environmental Single Cell Genomics facility (eSCG), is a joint venture between the University of Exeter and Plymouth Marine Laboratory (PML), and funded by the Natural Environment Research Council and the Wolfson Foundation.

It has been created to study the genomic characteristics of individual cells without the usual requirement to culture and grow them.

The facility, which boasts cutting-edge cell sorting equipment, liquid handling robotics and molecular biology analysis tools, is housed within an ultraclean room to prevent contamination.

Equipment within the facility can separate and isolate specific individual cells (and viruses) and then characterise their contents using molecular techniques. Used together the possibility exists to study not just what individual cells are present, but also what they are doing and precisely how they are doing it.

It is expected that eSCG will become a focal point for UK and international scientists to unlock the mysteries of unculturable and novel organisms from the environment.