Can we sequence RNA directly

[SDPA_Pet]

Hello, couple of years ago, I was in a NGS workshop. I was told some company was trying to develop some kits, so we can do metatranscriptomics without building cDNA libraries. I was wondering if this kit is available now?

Or now most sequencing center still use cDNA to do metatranscriptomics.

[nucacidhunter]

I know two technologies for direct transcriptome analysis:
1- nanoString: it can only quantify known transcripts
2- MinIon: the kit currently is offered for early access

cDNA still is the most common method.

[Bukowski]

http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/08/12/068809

[gringer]

1- nanoString: it can only quantify known transcripts

nanoString doesn't "sequence" the RNA, unless you're referring to Hyb & Seq (which can sequence novel sequences, but is still in the technology development stages).