Aptamer: A futuristic approach in diagnosis rivaling antibodies

Abstract

Antibodies have been known for more than three decades and have proved to be invaluable tool for rapid and advanced diagnostics. Although, antibodies are used routinely in most of diagnostic tests as biorecognition elements, however, their high cost of production, shorter-shelf life, animal requirement for production, stability issues, batch-to-batch variations had significant drawbacks on the field of diagnostics. Aptamers are short oligonucleotides of less 100 nucleotides that bind selectively and specifically with high affinity to their targets, ranging from small molecule like a toxin to a large cancerous cells, due to their unique 3-D conformational. Combining aptamers with different nanostructures has elevated their diagnostic capability and made them highly useful in various biosensing platforms. Some of the biosensing assays like ELASA, Colorimetry, Electrochemical, Microfluidics, Lateral flow, etc. using aptamers and their modified forms with nanostructures are expatiated in the present chapter. In addition, the limitations and benefits of these assays are also discussed.