Separation of microRNA 21 as a cancer marker from glioblastoma cell line using molecularly imprinted polymer coated on silica nanoparticles.

In this study for the first time, microRNA was separated on the basis of affinity for a phase made using molecular imprinting technology. We describe the synthesis and preliminary testing of molecularly imprinted polymers for separation of the microRNA 21 from the lysate obtained from brain cancer cell line. A new molecularly imprinted polymer was synthesized using microRNA 21 and dopamine as the template and functional monomer, respectively. Dopamine was polymerized on the surface of silica nanoparticles. A control polymer, or nonimprinted polymer, was prepared under the same conditions without the use of the template molecule. The synthesized polymer was characterized by FTIR spectroscopy and its morphology was investigated by scanning electron microscopy. To compare the performance of this polymer, the results were compared with trizol extraction as a routine method of RNA extraction. The proposed method was applied for separation of microRNA 21 from cell lysate and its specificity was validated with quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction technique.