New Nanomechanical Method For Detecting Disease- And Treatment-Relevant Genes

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New Nanomechanical Method For Detecting Disease- And Treatment-

Relevant Genes

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=58644

Innovative technique offers new possibilities for matching drug

treatments more closely to patient needs

Researchers from the National Centre of Competence in Research at

the newly established Swiss Nanoscience Institute (SNI) in Basel,

together with Roche scientists, have developed an innovative method

for the rapid and sensitive detection of disease- and treatment-

relevant genes. The results of this research are published today in

the December issue of the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

Ulrich Certa, Head of Functional Genomics at the Roche Centre for

Medical Genomics, comments: " Our research results show that these

new nanomechanical sensors can be used for the direct and continuous

monitoring of patients' response to a given treatment. This

promising new technology takes us a step nearer to tailoring

treatment directly to patients' needs, hopefully with ever fewer

adverse effects. "

Many different body processes are involved in disease and its

treatment. Gene activities are regulated in varying ways depending

on heredity, partly accounting for the often differing individual

responses to a given drug. What helps one patient may have no effect

on another, or may even have adverse effects.

The new method detects active genes directly by measuring their

transcripts (messenger ribonucleic acid [mRNA]), which represent the

intermediate step and link to protein synthesis. Short complementary

nucleic acid segments (sensors) are attached to tiny silicon

cantilevers which are only 450 nanometres thick (one nanometre is a

millionth of a millimetre) and therefore react with extraordinary

sensitivity. Binding of the targeted gene transcript to its matching

counterpart on one of the cantilevers results in optically

measurable mechanical bending.

In the paper now published the researchers cite the example of a

tumour cell line in which interferon treatment activates an

important gene for controlling cell growth to show that this

nanomechanical method can be used for rapid gene transcript

detection.

Being so sensitive, this new type of nanomechanical sensor has no

need to label or copy the target molecules, thus greatly increasing

measurement precision. Because the method also works within minutes,

it could be used as a real-time sensor for continuously monitoring

biomedical processes. An array of different gene transcripts can

even be measured in parallel by aligning appropriately coated

cantilevers alongside each other like the teeth of a comb.

The new method complements current molecular diagnostic techniques

such as the gene chip and real-time PCR. It could be used as a real-

time sensor for continuously monitoring various clinical parameters

or for detecting rapidly replicating pathogens that make prompt

diagnosis essential.