Single-cell western blotting

To measure cell-to-cell variation in protein-mediated functions — a hallmark of biological processes — we developed an approach to conduct ~10(3) concurrent single-cell western blots (scWesterns) in ~4 hours. A microscope slide supporting a 30 µm-thick photoactive polyacrylamide gel enables western blotting comprised of: settling of single cells into microwells, lysis in situ, gel electrophoresis, photoinitiated blotting to immobilize proteins, and antibody probing. We apply this scWestern to monitor single rat neural stem cell differentiation and responses to mitogen stimulation. The scWestern quantifies target proteins even with off-target antibody binding, multiplexes to 11 protein targets per single cell with detection thresholds of <30,000 molecules, and supports analyses of low starting cell numbers (~200) when integrated with fluorescence activated cell sorting. The scWestern thus overcomes limitations in single-cell protein analysis (i.e., antibody fidelity, sensitivity, and starting cell number) and constitutes a versatile tool for the study of complex cell populations at single-cell resolution.