Small molecules are highly relevant targets for detection and quantification. They are also used to diagnose and monitor the progression of disease and infectious processes and track the presence of contaminants. Fluorogenic RNA-based biosensors (FRBs) represent an appealing solution to the problem of detecting these targets.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFluorinated compounds, whether naturally occurring or from anthropogenic origin, have been extensively exploited in the last century. Degradation of these compounds by physical or biochemical processes is expected to result in the release of fluoride. Several fluoride detection mechanisms have been previously described.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFToehold-mediated strand displacement (TMSD) was tested as a tool to edit information in synthetic digital polymers. Uniform DNA-polymer biohybrid macromolecules were first synthesized by automated phosphoramidite chemistry and characterized by HPLC, mass spectrometry, and polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE). These precursors were diblock structures containing a synthetic poly(phosphodiester) (PPDE) segment covalently attached to a single-stranded DNA sequence.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNucleic acids are not only essential actors of cell life but also extremely appealing molecular objects in the development of synthetic molecules for biotechnological application, such as biosensors to report on the presence and concentration of a target ligand by emission of a measurable signal. In this work, FluorMango, a fluorogenic ribonucleic acid (RNA)-based biosensor specific for fluoride is introduced. The molecule consists of two RNA aptamer modules, a fluoride-specific sensor derived from the crcB riboswitch which changes its structure upon interaction with the target ion, and the light-up RNA Mango-III that emits fluorescence when complexed with a fluorogen.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSmall-molecule sensing is a major issue as they can serve both in fundamental science and as makers of various diseases, contaminations, or even environment pollution. RNA aptamers are single-stranded nucleic acids that can adopt different conformations and specifically recognize a wide range of ligands, making them good candidates to develop biosensors of small molecules. Recently, light-up RNA aptamers have been introduced and used as starting building blocks of RNA-based fluorogenic biosensors.
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