Prescription drug overdose and abuse is a leading cause of death in the United States.  It is a serious issue and has become increasingly problematic as opioids are being prescribed with a higher frequency.   For this reason, fast, accurate detection of small drug molecules is crucial. The current standard for use in clinical drug detection is an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) that uses a series of antibodies to bind to the target drug and enable quantification via a colorimetric output.  However, the antibodies used in an ELISA often cannot distinguish between similar molecules. Aptamers are short sequences of DNA that have emerged as a promising alternative to antibodies, as they are generated in vitro, where negative selections can be used to increase target selectivity. These aptamers can be cleaved to make split aptamers that only assemble in the presence of the target small molecule. While this system has the potential to greatly improve drug detection,one inherent problem is the need for more split aptamers that are selective for their small-molecule targets. While there are many known aptamers, there are very few known split aptamers that bind small-molecules.  This research has produced a reliable method of separating aptamers with a privileged structure to generate new split aptamers for more targets. Continuing research focuses on generating split aptamer assays for opioids and water toxins.

General approach for engineering small-molecule-binding DNA split aptamers

248th National Meeting (2014)

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