Nicking-enhanced rolling circle amplification for sensitive fluorescent detection of cancer-related microRNAs

Highly sensitive detection of microRNA-21 by nitrogen-doped carbon dots-based ratio fluorescent probe via nuclease-assisted rolling circle amplification strategy

Highly sensitive and selective detection of microRNA-21 (miRNA-21) in biological samples is critical for the disease diagnosis and cancer treatment. In this study, a nitrogen-doped carbon dots (N-CDs)-based ratio fluorescence sensing strategy was constructed for miRNA-21 detection with high sensitivity and excellent specificity. Bright-blue N-CDs (λ_ex/λ_em = 378 nm/460 nm) were synthesized by facile one-step microwave-assisted pyrolysis method by using uric acid as the single precursor, and the absolute fluorescence quantum yield and fluorescence lifetime of N-CDs were 35.8% and 5.54 ns separately. The padlock probe hybridized with miRNA-21 firstly and then was cyclized by T4 RNA ligase 2 to form a circular template. At the present of dNTPs and phi29 DNA polymerase, the oligonucleotide sequence in miRNA-21 was prolonged to hybridize with the surplus oligonucleotide sequences in circular template, generating long and reduplicated oligonucleotide sequences containing abundant guanine nucleotides. Separate G-quadruplex sequences were generated after the addition of Nt.BbvCI nicking endonuclease, and then hemin bound with G-quadruplex sequence to construct the G-quadruplex DNAzyme. Such G-quadruplex DNAzyme catalyzed the redox reaction of o-phenylenediamine (OPD) with H₂O₂, finally producing the yellowish-brown 2,3-diaminophenazine (DAP) (λ_em = 562 nm). Due to the inner filter effect between N-CDs and DAP, the ratio fluorescence signal of DAP with N-CDs was utilized for sensitive detection of miRNA-21 with detection limit of 0.87 pM. Such approach has practical feasibility and excellent specificity for miRNA-21 analysis during highly homological miRNA family in HeLa cell lysates and human serum samples.

Rapid and ultrasensitive miRNA detection by combining endonuclease reactions in a rolling circle amplification (RCA)-based hairpin DNA fluorescent assay

MicroRNA (miRNA) sensing strategies employing rolling circle amplification (RCA) coupled with the hairpin DNA (HD) probe-mediated FRET assay have shown promise, but achieving rapid, sensitive, and specific detection of target miRNA remains a challenge in clinical diagnostics. Herein, we incorporate PstI endonuclease cleavage (PEC) into a conventional RCA-based HD probe FRET assay to develop an effective and feasible method. Long single-stranded RCA products are synthesized from miRNA-21 loaded on a circular dumbbell DNA, and the resultant RCA products self-assemble to generate long HD structures with double-stranded stem regions that are specifically recognized and cleaved by PstI endonucleases when incubated with PstI enzymes. This releases large amounts of short single-stranded DNA fragments that hybridize and open to the complementary loop-stem regions of HD probes labeled with FAM at one end and BHQ-1 at the other, resulting in a reduction in FRET efficiency. This assay achieves a 39.7 aM detection limit for target miRNA-21, approximately 37-fold higher than that of the conventional assay (1.5 fM). Moreover, quantitative detection is possible in a wide range from 1 aM to 1 pM within 90 min with high sequence specificity. We demonstrate the assay with the detection of target miRNA-21 in total RNA extracted from MCF-7 cancer cells.

Isothermal Amplification Technology for Disease Diagnosis

Isothermal amplification (IA) is a nucleic acid amplification technology (NAAT) that has contributed significantly to the healthcare system. The combination of NAAT with a suitable detection platform resulted in higher sensitivity, specificity, and rapid disease diagnosis. Traditional NAAT, such as polymerase chain reaction (PCR), is widely applied in the general healthcare system but is rarely accessed in resource-limited hospitals. Some IA methods provide a rapid, sensitive, specific, and simple method for disease diagnosis. However, not all IA techniques have been regularly used in clinical applications because different biomarkers and sample types affect either the enzyme in the IA system or sample preparation. This review focuses on the application of some IA techniques that have been applied in the medical field and have the potential for use at points of care.

Cancer drug resistance related microRNAs: recent advances in detection methods

MiRNAs are related to cancer drug resistance through various mechanisms. The advanced detection methods for the miRNAs are reviewed.

A sensing system constructed by combining a structure-switchable molecular beacon with nicking-enhanced rolling circle amplification for highly sensitive miRNA detection

A novel amplification assay strategy is developed for the highly sensitive detection of miRNA-21 based on a combination of a structure-switchable molecular beacon with nicking-enhanced rolling circle amplification.

Recent advances in biological detection with rolling circle amplification: design strategy, biosensing mechanism, and practical applications

Rolling circle amplification (RCA) is a simple and isothermal DNA amplification technique that is used to generate thousands of repeating DNA sequences using circular templates under the catalysis of DNA polymerase.

Rolling Circle Amplification as a Universal Method for the Analysis of a Wide Range of Biological Targets

Detection and quantification of biotargets are important analytical tasks, which are solved using a wide range of various methods. In recent years, methods based on the isothermal amplification of nucleic acids (NAs) have been extensively developed. Among them, a special place is occupied by rolling circle amplification (RCA), which is used not only for the detection of a specific NA but also for the analysis of other biomolecules, and is also a versatile platform for the development of highly sensitive methods and convenient diagnostic devices. The present review reveals a number of methodical aspects of RCA-mediated analysis; in particular, the data on its key molecular participants are presented, the methods for increasing the efficiency and productivity of RCA are described, and different variants of reporter systems are briefly characterized. Differences in the techniques of RCA-mediated analysis of biotargets of various types are shown. Some examples of using different RCA variants for the solution of specific diagnostic problems are given.

Recent advances of fluorescent biosensors based on cyclic signal amplification technology in biomedical detection

The cyclic signal amplification technology has been widely applied for the ultrasensitive detection of many important biomolecules, such as nucleic acids, proteins, enzymes, adenosine triphosphate (ATP), metal ions, exosome, etc. Due to their low content in the complex biological samples, traditional detection methods are insufficient to satisfy the requirements for monitoring those biomolecules. Therefore, effective and sensitive biosensors based on cyclic signal amplification technology are of great significance for the quick and simple diagnosis and treatment of diseases. Fluorescent biosensor based on cyclic signal amplification technology has become a research hotspot due to its simple operation, low cost, short time, high sensitivity and high specificity. This paper introduces several cyclic amplification methods, such as rolling circle amplification (RCA), strand displacement reactions (SDR) and enzyme-assisted amplification (EAA), and summarizes the research progress of using this technology in the detection of different biomolecules in recent years, in order to provide help for the research of more efficient and sensitive detection methods.

Rolling Circle and Loop Mediated Isothermal Amplification Strategy for Ultrasensitive miRNA Detection

Rolling circle amplification (RCA) and loop mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) were combined to establish the rolling circle and loop mediated isothermal amplification (RC-LAMP) method for miRNA detection. With the participation of Bst 2.0 DNA Polymerase, the method enabled RCA and LAMP amplification to occur simultaneously without thermal cycling. The limit of detection of RC-LAMP was 500 amol/L, which is comparable to previously reported amplification strategies. Moreover, its upper limit of quantitation was higher and showed a stronger resistance to matrix interference. Therefore, it is possible to detect low concentrations of miRNA in samples by increasing the total RNA added. Owing to its facile detection mode and simple operation, this method has great potential in clinical sample detection.

Recent advances in rolling circle amplification-based biosensing strategies-A review

Rolling circle amplification (RCA) is an efficient enzymatic isothermal reaction that using circular probe as a template to generate long tandem single-stranded DNA or RNA products under the initiation of short DNA or RNA primers. As a simplified derivative of natural rolling circle replication which synthesizes copies of circular nucleic acids molecules such as plasmids, RCA amplifies the circular template rapidly without thermal cycling and finds various applications in molecular biology. Compared with other amplification strategies, RCA has many obvious advantages. Firstly, because of the strict complementarity required in ligation of a padlock probe, it endows the RCA reaction with high specificity and can even be utilized to distinguish single base mismatches. Secondly, through the introduction of multiple primers, exponential amplification can be achieved easily and leads to a good sensitivity. Thirdly, RCA products can be customized by manipulating circular templates to generate functional nucleic acids such as aptamer, DNAzymes and restriction enzyme sites. Moreover, the RCA has good biocompatibility and is especially suitable for in situ detection. Therefore, RCA has attracted considerable attention as an efficient and potential tool for highly sensitive detection of biomarkers. Herein, we comprehensively introduce the fundamental principles of RCA technology, summarize it from three aspects including initiation mode, amplification mode and signal output mode, and discuss the recent application of RCA-based biosensor in this review.

Sub-attomole detection of HIV-1 using padlock probes and rolling circle amplification combined with microfluidic affinity chromatography

Despite significant progress in diagnostics and disease management during the past decades, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infections are still responsible for nearly 1 million deaths every year, mostly in resource-limited settings. Thus, novel, accurate and cost-effective tools for viral load monitoring become crucial to allow specific diagnostics and the effective monitoring of the associated antiviral therapies. Herein, we report an effective combination of a (1) padlock probe (PLP)-mediated rolling circle amplification (RCA) bioassay and an (2) agarose bead-based microfluidic device for the affinity chromatography-based capture and detection of RCA products (RCPs) pre-labelled simultaneously with biotin and an organic fluorophore. This method allowed the efficient capture of ~1 μm-sized RCPs followed by their quantification either as discrete signals or an average fluorescence signal, thus being compatible with both high-resolution imaging for maximum sensitivity as well as simpler optical detection setups. A limit of detection < 30 fM was obtained for HIV-1 synthetic target with just a single round of RCA, comparable to recently reported procedures requiring technically complex amplification strategies such as hyperbranching and/or enzymatic digestion/amplification. Furthermore, targeting a set of five conserved regions in the HIV-1 gag gene, the method could specifically detect HIV-1 in 293T cell culture supernatants, as well as a set of 11 HIV-1 NIH reference samples with four different subtypes. The reported method provides simplicity of operation, unique versatility of signal transduction (i.e. average or discrete signals), and potential coupling with previously reported miniaturized photodetectors. These combined features hold promise for bringing RCA-based molecular diagnostics closer to the point-of-care.

Homogeneous circle-to-circle amplification for real-time optomagnetic detection of SARS-CoV-2 RdRp coding sequence

Circle-to-circle amplification (C2CA) is a specific and precise cascade nucleic acid amplification method consisting of more than one round of padlock probe ligation and rolling circle amplification (RCA). Although C2CA provides a high amplification efficiency with a negligible increase of false-positive risk, it contains several step-by-step operation processes. We herein demonstrate a homogeneous and isothermal nucleic acid quantification strategy based on C2CA and optomagnetic analysis of magnetic nanoparticle (MNP) assembly. The proposed homogeneous circle-to-circle amplification eliminates the need for additional monomerization and ligation steps after the first round of RCA, and combines two amplification rounds in a one-pot reaction. The second round of RCA produces amplicon coils that anneal to detection probes grafted onto MNPs, resulting in MNP assembly that can be detected in real-time using an optomagnetic sensor. The proposed methodology was applied for the detection of a synthetic complementary DNA of SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, also known as 2019-nCoV) RdRp (RNA-dependent RNA polymerase) coding sequence, achieving a detection limit of 0.4 fM with a dynamic detection range of 3 orders of magnitude and a total assay time of ca. 100 min. A mathematical model was set up and validated to predict the assay performance. Moreover, the proposed method was specific to distinguish SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 sequences with high similarity.

Target-fueled catalytic hairpin assembly for sensitive and multiplex microRNA detection

As a typical strand displacement-based DNA circuit, the catalytic hairpin assembly (CHA) has the potential to transduce and amplify signals for analytical applications, but little practice has been fulfilled in Luminex-based multiple microRNAs (miRNAs) detection. Here, we proposed a target-fueled CHA-based platform for sensitive and multiple miRNAs detection, by virtue of the multiplex characteristic of the Luminex xMAP platform. The cyclic use of target miRNA, which forms a substantial amount of H1-H2 duplexes, has amplified the fluorescent response to achieve sensitive sensing. Key experimental conditions including hairpin probe concentrations, reaction temperature, and concentration of SA-PE were optimized. Liver tumor-related miRNA-21, miRNA-122, and miRNA-222 could be simultaneously detected with LOD of 2 pM. Overall, the proposed method first combined CHA with the Luminex xMAP system to construct a sensitive sensing platform suitable for multiple miRNAs detection in real sample analysis, which could potentially be applied in biomedical research and clinical diagnosis. Graphical abstract.

Automated on-chip analysis of tuberculosis drug-resistance mutation with integrated DNA ligation and amplification

Detection of a single base mutation in Mycobacterium tuberculosis DNA can provide fast and highly specific diagnosis of antibiotic-resistant tuberculosis. Mutation-specific ligation of padlock probes (PLPs) on the target followed by rolling circle amplification (RCA) is highly specific, but challenging to integrate in a simple microfluidic device due to the low temperature stability of the phi29 polymerase and the interference of phi29 with the PLP annealing and ligation. Here, we utilized the higher operation temperature and temperature stability of Equiphi29 polymerase to simplify the integration of the PLP ligation and RCA steps of an RCA assay in two different strategies performed at uniform temperature. In strategy I, PLP annealing took place off-chip and the PLP ligation and RCA were performed in one pot and the two reactions were clocked by a change of the temperature. For a total assay time of about 1.5 h, we obtained a limit of detection of 2 pM. In strategy II, the DNA ligation mixture and the RCA mixture were separated into two chambers on a microfluidic disc. After on-disc PLP annealing and ligation, the disc was spun to mix reagents and initiate RCA. For a total assay time of about 2 h, we obtained a limit of detection of 5 pM. Graphical abstract.

A self-delivery DNA nanoprobe for reliable microRNA imaging in live cells by aggregation induced red-shift-emission

A Y-shape and pyrene-modified DNA self-assembly is developed to sensitively and specifically detect microRNA through a pyrene excimer–monomer switch.

Direct and sensitive detection of circulating miRNA in human serum by ligase-mediated amplification

MicroRNAs (miRNA) involve in regulating different physiological processes whose dysregulation is associated with a wide range of diseases including cancers, diabetes and cardiovascular problems. Herein, we report a direct, sensitive and highly selective detection assay for circulating microRNA (miRNA). This detection strategy employs magnetic nanoparticles as the reaction platform which can not only allow online pre-concentration and selective separation but also integrates ligation reaction with amplification to enhance the sensitivity of the detection assay. With the presence of the target miRNA, the locked nucleic acid (LNA)-modified molecular beacon (MB) opens up, exposing the binding sites at two ends. The 3'- and 5'-end of the MB responsible for the attachment onto the magnetic nanoparticles, and reporting probe for the attachment of the pair of amplification probes respectively. The ligase ligate RNA to DNA enhance the amplification efficiency. Upon labelled with intercalating fluorophores (YOYO-1) on the hybrids, the quantification of the target miRNA was determined by measuring the fluorescence intensity. A detection limit of 314 fM was achieved with trace amount of sample consumption (~20 μL). As a proof of concept, miRNA-149 was chosen as the target miRNA. This assay is capable of discriminating single-base and reliably quantifying circulating miRNA-149 in both healthy and cancer patient's serums. The result obtained was comparable with that of quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR), suggesting that this direct and sensitive assay can be served as a promising, non-invasive tool for early diagnosis of breast cancer and colorectal cancer.

A conformational switch-based aptasensor for the chemiluminescence detection of microRNA

A simple microRNA (miRNA) aptasensor has been developed combining the conformational switch of a streptavidin aptamer and isothermal strand displacement amplification. In the presence of its target miRNA, the allosteric molecular beacon (aMB) probe immobilized on the plate can be 'switched on' and release the streptavidin aptamer. At the same time, Klenow fragment (3'→5' exo-) is utilized to initiate DNA-strand displacement, which starts the target recycling process. Based on the aptamer' high binding affinity and subsequent catalytic chemiluminescence (CL) detection, this CL strategy is highly specific in distinguishing mature miRNAs in same family. It exhibits a dynamic range of four orders of magnitude with a detection limit of 50 fM, and shows great potential for miRNA-related clinical practices and biochemical research.

Ultrasensitive detection of miRNA via one-step rolling circle-quantitative PCR (RC-qPCR)

A novel microRNA (miRNA) quantification method has been developed using one-step rolling circle-quantitative PCR (RC-qPCR) analysis. Vent (exo-) DNA polymerase is firstly utilized to combine a rolling circle amplification (RCA) and qPCR in one step with high sensitivity and specificity in our RC-qPCR assay. Before performing the RC-qPCR, a padlock probe is ligated only when it is perfectly hybridized with miRNA. This ligation-based miRNA assay is highly specific for mature miRNAs, discriminating among related miRNAs that differ by as little as one nucleotide. It exhibits a dynamic range of seven orders of magnitude with a detection limit of 500 aM, and could be also used for the quantification of other small RNA molecules such as short interfering RNAs (siRNAs).