title: Trace MicroRNA Quantification by Means of Plasmon-Enhanced Hybridization Chain Reaction.
abstract: Quantifying trace microRNAs (miRNAs) is extremely important in a number of biomedical applications but remains a great challenge. Here we present an enzyme-free amplification strategy called plasmon-enhanced hybridization chain reaction (PE-HCR) for quantifying trace miRNAs with an outstanding linear range from 1 fM to 1 pM (r(2) = 0.991), along with a detection limit of 0.043 fM (1300 molecules in 50 μL of sample). The merits of the PE-HCR assay, including high sensitivity and specificity, quantitative detection, no enzyme involvement, low false positives, and easy-to-operate procedures, have been demonstrated for high-confidence quantification of the contents of miRNAs in even single cancer cells. The PE-HCR assay may open up new avenues for highly sensitive quantification of biomarkers and thus should hold great potentials in clinical diagnosis and prognosis.
authors.affiliation: College of Chemistry, Research Center for Analytical Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, and Tianjin Key Laboratory of Molecular Recognition and Biosensing, Nankai University , Tianjin 300071, China.
authors.forename: Fangfei
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Yin
authors.affiliation: College of Chemistry, Research Center for Analytical Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, and Tianjin Key Laboratory of Molecular Recognition and Biosensing, Nankai University , Tianjin 300071, China.
authors.forename: Huiqiao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: College of Chemistry, Research Center for Analytical Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, and Tianjin Key Laboratory of Molecular Recognition and Biosensing, Nankai University , Tianjin 300071, China.
authors.forename: Qiang
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: College of Chemistry, Research Center for Analytical Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, and Tianjin Key Laboratory of Molecular Recognition and Biosensing, Nankai University , Tianjin 300071, China.
authors.forename: Xia
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Gao
authors.affiliation: College of Chemistry, Research Center for Analytical Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, and Tianjin Key Laboratory of Molecular Recognition and Biosensing, Nankai University , Tianjin 300071, China.
authors.forename: Yongmei
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yin
authors.affiliation: College of Chemistry, Research Center for Analytical Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, and Tianjin Key Laboratory of Molecular Recognition and Biosensing, Nankai University , Tianjin 300071, China.|Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering (Tianjin) , Tianjin 300071, China.
authors.forename: Dingbin
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Liu
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000032:analysis*; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D021141:Nucleic Acid Amplification Techniques / Q000379:methods*; D009693:Nucleic Acid Hybridization
chemical_list: D035683:MicroRNAs