- Replogle, Joseph M;
- Norman, Thomas M;
- Xu, Albert;
- Hussmann, Jeffrey A;
- Chen, Jin;
- Cogan, J Zachery;
- Meer, Elliott J;
- Terry, Jessica M;
- Riordan, Daniel P;
- Srinivas, Niranjan;
- Fiddes, Ian T;
- Arthur, Joseph G;
- Alvarado, Luigi J;
- Pfeiffer, Katherine A;
- Mikkelsen, Tarjei S;
- Weissman, Jonathan S;
- Adamson, Britt
Single-cell CRISPR screens enable the exploration of mammalian gene function and genetic regulatory networks. However, use of this technology has been limited by reliance on indirect indexing of single-guide RNAs (sgRNAs). Here we present direct-capture Perturb-seq, a versatile screening approach in which expressed sgRNAs are sequenced alongside single-cell transcriptomes. Direct-capture Perturb-seq enables detection of multiple distinct sgRNA sequences from individual cells and thus allows pooled single-cell CRISPR screens to be easily paired with combinatorial perturbation libraries that contain dual-guide expression vectors. We demonstrate the utility of this approach for high-throughput investigations of genetic interactions and, leveraging this ability, dissect epistatic interactions between cholesterol biogenesis and DNA repair. Using direct capture Perturb-seq, we also show that targeting individual genes with multiple sgRNAs per cell improves efficacy of CRISPR interference and activation, facilitating the use of compact, highly active CRISPR libraries for single-cell screens. Last, we show that hybridization-based target enrichment permits sensitive, specific sequencing of informative transcripts from single-cell RNA-seq experiments.