Descripción del proyecto
Sensores de miARN basados en nanopartículas
Los biosensores son dispositivos analíticos que emplean componentes biológicos como enzimas, anticuerpos o ácidos nucleicos para detectar y medir sustancias específicas en muestras. El componente biológico interactúa con el analito diana para producir una señal eléctrica, óptica o electroquímica medible. Los biosensores han despertado un gran interés por sus aplicaciones diagnósticas y terapéuticas. El equipo del proyecto Upbiosens, financiado por las acciones Marie Skłodowska-Curie, desarrollará un novedoso biosensor basado en nanopartículas que incorpora cadenas de ADN para detectar miARN, pequeñas moléculas de ARN que sirven como reguladores de la expresión génica. Los investigadores utilizarán fluoróforos para la medición cuantitativa de ácidos nucleicos, ampliando la aplicabilidad de estos novedosos nanosensores a la terapia génica y el análisis forense.
Objetivo
The Upbiosens project describes a novel method to produce water-dispersible and stable DNA-capped upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs), keeping intact (or enhancing) the properties of both DNA and UCNPs. The UCNP@DNA nanohybrid will be able to detect the complementary target miRNA or DNA sequence. This detection will be based on the UCNP emission changes after NIR excitation in the presence of the fluorophore target RNA/DNA sequence. The hybridization will enable FRET from the UCNP to the fluorophore upon NIR irradiation, which will allow the quantitative measurement of nucleic acid. In addition, this new strategy for DNA functionalization of UCNPs will enable the control of the UCNP size during the functionalization step as well as the distance between UCNP and the energy acceptor. Both issues are critical for the design of novel, rapid, highly selective and sensitive FRET-based biosensors. This approach will be demonstrated for wo different compositions of UCNPs, NaYF4: Yb, Er (excitation at 980 nm) and NaYF4: Yb, Nd, Er (excitation at 800 nm) in order to enhance optical properties. The excitation at 800 nm reduces the overheating of biosamples due to the light absorption by water.
Taking into account the exceptional UCNPs emissive properties, the capability for in vitro nucleic acid imaging of the nanobiosensor will also be evaluated. To our knowledge, the combination of a nucleic acid sensing and imaging using UCNP-based nanohybrids has not yet been attempted. This dual NIR NA biosensor/bioimaging nanohybrid can be promisingly bio-implemented, such as in prognosis, diagnostics and treatment of diseases, gene therapy, or forensic analysis.
Ámbito científico
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringsensorsbiosensors
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesbiochemistrybiomoleculesnucleic acids
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesgeneticsDNA
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesgeneticsRNA
- engineering and technologynanotechnologynano-materials
Programa(s)
Régimen de financiación
MSCA-IF-EF-ST - Standard EFCoordinador
75794 Paris
Francia