title: Applications of aptasensors in clinical diagnostics.
abstract: Aptamers are artificial oligonucleotides (DNA or RNA) selected in vitro that bind a broad range of targets with high affinity and specificity; a sensitive yet simple method to utilize aptamers as recognition elements for the development of biosensors (aptasensors) is to transduce the signal electrochemically. So far, aptasensors have been applied to clinical diagnostics and several technologies are in development. Aptasensors will extend the limits of current clinical diagnostics. Although the potential diagnostic applications are unlimited, the most current applications are foreseen in the areas of biomarker detection, cancer clinical testing, detection of infectious microorganisms and viruses. This review attempts to list examples of the research progresses of aptamers in biosensor platforms that have been published in recent years; in particular, we display cases of aptasensors that are already incorporated in clinical diagnostics or have potential applications in clinical diagnostics.
authors.affiliation: National Center for Clinical Laboratories, Beijing Hospital, Beijing 100730, China.|Graduate School, Peking Union Medical College, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Beijing 100730, China.
authors.forename: Ping
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Hong
authors.affiliation: National Center for Clinical Laboratories, Beijing Hospital, Beijing 100730, China.|Graduate School, Peking Union Medical College, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Beijing 100730, China.
authors.forename: Wenli
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: National Center for Clinical Laboratories, Beijing Hospital, Beijing 100730, China.|Graduate School, Peking Union Medical College, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Beijing 100730, China.
authors.forename: Jinming
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Li
mesh_terms: D052157:Aptamers, Nucleotide / Q000032:analysis* / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D015374:Biosensing Techniques / Q000295:instrumentation*; D003217:Conductometry / Q000295:instrumentation*; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D007118:Immunoassay / Q000295:instrumentation*; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis / Q000295:instrumentation*; D025941:Protein Interaction Mapping / Q000295:instrumentation*; D014159:Transducers
chemical_list: D052157:Aptamers, Nucleotide