Recently, a number of protocols extending RNA-sequencing to the single-cell regime have been published. However, we were concerned that the additional steps to deal with such minute quantities of input sample would introduce serious biases that would make analysis of the data using existing approaches invalid. In this study, we performed a critical evaluation of several of these low-volume RNA-seq protocols, and found that they performed slightly less well in metrics of interest to us than a more standard protocol, but with at least two orders of magnitude less sample required. We also explored a simple modification to one of these protocols that, for many samples, reduced the cost of library preparation to approximately $20/sample.

INTRODUCTION The study of millisecond radio transients is important for a number of fundamental problems in astrophysics, including the characterization of the intergalactic medium, discovering exoplanets, and understanding the lifecycle of neutron stars. These transients are rare and unpredictable, requiring extensive blind surveys for a chance to detect a single event. However, even a single detection can have huge science payoffs, since they can help understand exotic states of matter or illuminate distant corners of the universe. Recent technological advances in radio astronomy, particularly the use of large arrays of antennas known as interferometers, enable data collection at time resolutions sufficient to study these phenomena with exquisite sensitivity, resolution, and flexibility. This power comes with the cost of handling data streams of 1 TB hour−1, far faster than transportation and archiving infrastructure can support. Next generation radio telescopes will increase this data flow and requisite computing requirements by orders of magnitude. Evolutionary changes to data analysis will not save radio astronomers from this data deluge. A revolutionary approach is needed to do science with massive data streams. I am interested in developing the concepts of _real-time anomaly detection_ and _data triage_ as solutions to this big data challenge.

FAST RADIO TRANSIENTS Fast radio transients are pulses of dispersed radio emission lasting less than 1 second. Slower radio transients originate predominantly in synchrotron emission, while faster transients are caused by coherent processes. Furthermore, at timescales faster than 1 second, propagation through the Galactic plasma induces dispersion, the frequency-dependent arrival time quantified by dispersion measure (DM), that begins to be detectable at MHz through GHz radio frequencies. Fast, Extragalactic Bursts Fast transients surveys at the Parkes Observatory has revealed a new population of radio transients: the FRB . Their DMs range up to 1100 pc cm−3, an order of magnitude larger than expected from the Galaxy and consistent with propagation through the IGM from distances up to z∼1. Basic questions about FRBs remain open: _What are they?_ and _How can we use them?_ If they do in fact lie at cosmological distances, their dispersion can measure the baryonic mass of the IGM, much as Galactic pulsars of known distance have mapped the electron content of the Milky Way . Beyond using FRBs as probes, understanding the origin of FRBs may have relevance to gamma-ray bursts and sources of gravitational waves . Pulsars, RRATs Similar pulsar surveys have discovered a new class of Galactic radio transient: the rotating radio transient . It is unclear whether extreme objects like magnetars or ordinary pulsars can generate pulses detected as RRATs . Moving slightly beyond our Galaxy, the most distant radio transients associated with a host galaxy are in M31 . The dispersion measure of any pulses known to be in M31 would make the first constraint on the Milky Way and M31 halo baryon content, which would help address the “missing baryon problem” . Flare Stars, Ultracool Dwarfs, Exoplanets Jupiter emits intense radio bursts that make it the brightest astronomical object in the solar system below 100 MHz. Coronal mass ejections (much as seen in the Sun), also drive radio fast, coherent radio flares. These processes could be used to measure magnetism and plasma properties of other stars and should profoundly affect the habitability of orbiting exoplanets . transients.