Isolation of a non-genomic origin fluoroquinolone responsive regulatory element using a combinatorial bioengineering approach.

Advances in chemical biology have led to selection of synthetic functional nucleic acids for in vivo applications. Discovery of synthetic nucleic acid regulatory elements has been a long-standing goal of chemical biologists. Availability of vast genome level genetic resources has motivated efforts for discovery and understanding of inducible synthetic genetic regulatory elements.

Non-enzymatic detection of urea using unmodified gold nanoparticles based aptasensor.

Biosensing nitrogenous compounds like urea is required to control the incidents of Economically Motivated Adulteration (EMA). In this study, we report the FluMag Systematic Evolution of Ligands by Exponential Enrichment (FluMag-SELEX) method to isolate a urea specific DNA aptamer with a dissociation constant (Kd) of 232 nM. The interaction of DNA aptamer with urea has been confirmed by affinity assay, CD analysis, melting curve analysis and truncation studies.

Genetic regulation of spy gene expression in Escherichia coli in the presence of protein unfolding agent ethanol.

In a living cell, folding of proteins is assisted by molecular chaperones and other folding helpers. In Escherichia coli (E. coli), recently an ATP independent chaperon 'Spy' was discovered which is highly up-regulated in the presence of protein unfolding agents like ethanol, butanol and tannic acid.