Issue 6, 2019

Sensitively distinguishing intracellular precursor and mature microRNA abundance

Abstract

Mature microRNAs (miRNAs) produced from precursor microRNAs (pre-miRNAs) by the RNase Dicer have showed significant potential for cancer diagnosis and prognosis due to their key regulatory roles in various pathological processes. However, discriminatory detection of low-abundance miRNAs and pre-miRNAs remains a key challenge since the mature sequence is also present in the pre-miRNA forms. Herein, we report a novel cascade reaction to sensitively distinguish miRNAs versus pre-miRNAs in living cells based on two pairs of programmable hairpin oligonucleotide probes with a simple sequence design. The programmable hairpin probes can metastably coexist until the introduction of miRNAs or pre-miRNAs, which can trigger a specific hybridization chain reaction (HCR), respectively, leading to the self-assembly of nicked DNA duplex structures and a remarkable specific fluorescence intensity increase. The system can readily and sensitively assess the miRNA or pre-miRNA abundance in a homogeneous solution. The intracellular miRNA and pre-miRNA expression level assessment in different living cells is realized. Thus, we provide a novel investigation tool for discriminatorily and accurately assessing miRNA and pre-miRNA abundance, which could be useful for the biomedical application of miRNAs.

Graphical abstract: Sensitively distinguishing intracellular precursor and mature microRNA abundance

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Edge Article
Submitted
26 Jul 2018
Accepted
27 Nov 2018
First published
28 Nov 2018
This article is Open Access

All publication charges for this article have been paid for by the Royal Society of Chemistry
Creative Commons BY-NC license

Chem. Sci., 2019,10, 1709-1715

Sensitively distinguishing intracellular precursor and mature microRNA abundance

F. Yang, Y. Cheng, Y. Cao, H. Dong, H. Lu, K. Zhang, X. Meng, C. Liu and X. Zhang, Chem. Sci., 2019, 10, 1709 DOI: 10.1039/C8SC03305F

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