diff --git a/src/rapids_singlecell/preprocessing/_hvg.py b/src/rapids_singlecell/preprocessing/_hvg.py
index 6db78c74..54d6785d 100644
--- a/src/rapids_singlecell/preprocessing/_hvg.py
+++ b/src/rapids_singlecell/preprocessing/_hvg.py
@@ -268,10 +268,8 @@ def in_bounds(
 
 def _hvg_expm1(X):
     if isinstance(X, DaskArray):
-        if isinstance(X._meta, cp.ndarray):
-            X = X.map_blocks(lambda X: cp.expm1(X), meta=_meta_dense(X.dtype))
-        elif isinstance(X._meta, csr_matrix):
-            X = X.map_blocks(lambda X: X.expm1(), meta=_meta_sparse(X.dtype))
+        meta = _meta_sparse if isinstance(X._meta, csr_matrix) else _meta_dense
+        X = X.map_blocks(_hvg_expm1, meta=meta(X.dtype))
     else:
         X = X.copy()
         if issparse(X):