AN UPDATED DEBARCODING TOOL FOR MASS CYTOMETRY WITH CELL TYPE-SPECIFIC AND CELL SAMPLE-SPECIFIC STRINGENCY ADJUSTMENT

Pooled sample analysis by mass cytometry barcoding carries many advantages: reduced antibody consumption, increased sample throughput, removal of cell doublets, reduction of cross-contamination by sample carryover, and the elimination of tube-to-tube-variability in antibody staining. A single-cell debarcoding algorithm was previously developed to improve the accuracy and yield of sample deconvolution, but this method was limited to using fixed parameters for debarcoding stringency filtering, which could introduce cell-specific or sample-specific bias to cell yield in scenarios where barcode staining intensity and variance are not uniform across the pooled samples. To address this issue, we have updated the algorithm to output debarcoding parameters for every cell in the sample-assigned FCS files, which allows for visualization and analysis of these parameters via flow cytometry analysis software. This strategy can be used to detect cell type-specific and sample-specific effects on the underlying cell data that arise during the debarcoding process. An additional benefit to this strategy is the decoupling of barcode stringency filtering from the debarcoding and sample assignment process. This is accomplished by removing the stringency filters during sample assignment, and then filtering after the fact with 1- and 2-dimensional gating on the debarcoding parameters which are output with the FCS files. These data exploration strategies serve as an important quality check for barcoded mass cytometry datasets, and allow cell type and sample-specific stringency adjustment that can remove bias in cell yield introduced during the debarcoding process.