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Nucleic acid aptamers in cancer medicine
Author(s) -
Cerchia Laura,
Hamm Jörg,
Libri Domenico,
Tavitian Bertrand,
de Franciscis Vittorio
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
febs letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.593
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1873-3468
pISSN - 0014-5793
DOI - 10.1016/s0014-5793(02)03275-1
Subject(s) - aptamer , nucleic acid , systematic evolution of ligands by exponential enrichment , computational biology , function (biology) , small molecule , selex aptamer technique , cancer , transformation (genetics) , chemistry , biology , biochemistry , microbiology and biotechnology , rna , genetics , gene
Many signalling proteins involved in diverse functions such as cell growth and differentiation can act as oncogenes and cause cellular transformation. These molecules represent attractive targets for cancer diagnosis or therapy and are therefore subject to intensive investigation. Aptamers are small nucleic acid molecules, isolated from combinatorial libraries by a procedure termed SELEX, that bind to a target molecule by providing a limited number of specific contact points embedded in a larger, defined three‐dimensional structure. In some cases aptamers have the potential to inhibit the biological function of the molecule resulting in useful reagents for target validation in a variety of disease models.