With extensive experience in aptamer development, our scientists are confident in providing a full range of cell-SELEX services to advance science and technology development. Creative Biolabs is able to provide cell SELEX services in an efficient and high-quality manner.
To avoid the pitfalls of aptamer selection for purified proteins, such as masked binding regions due to protein conformational changes, researchers have developed a method using whole living cells as targets for aptamer selection, called cell-SELEX. Unlike conventional SELEX techniques, cellular SELEX does not require any prior knowledge of the protein conformation. Moreover, the step of purifying the target protein, which may disrupt the native conformation, is ignored. During the whole screening process, all cell surface molecules will remain in their native environment, retaining native structure and post-translational modifications. Thus, aptamers selected using whole living cells will be able to bind to the natural folded conformation of the target on the cell. This shows great potential for investigating cell-specific diagnostic and therapeutic approaches.
Fig. 1 Cell-SELEX with a negative selection process [1].
Cell-SELEX can be used to discover the surface markers of specific cancer cells. Cell-specific aptamers can identify proteins with altered expression levels in diseased cells and subsequently identify specific receptors for the protein by mass spectrometry. This approach enables the discovery of new biomarkers in specific cancer cells, suggesting that Cell-SELEX can play an important role in cancer diagnosis and therapeutic development by developing specific aptamers that can then be used as probes to identify targets. Cell-SELEX technology and the aptamers screened by this technology provide valuable tools to isolate specific protein targets and facilitate the discovery of clinically important biomarkers.
Fig. 2 Application of aptamer for cancer therapy [2].
Cancer is a group of mutations and changes that originate at the genetic level, however, in the early stages of cancer, the number of tumor cells and the number of molecular markers are low, thus limiting the detection of the disease.
However, aptamers screened by Cell-SELEX can correctly differentiate between different types and even different subtypes of cancer cells. Also, the binding affinity of the aptamer to its target allows the detection of low levels of cancer cells, thus enabling early cancer diagnosis. Notably, aptamers can be coupled to fluorescent molecules for targeted imaging of cells, or to nanoparticles for signal enhancement.
Fig. 3 Aptamer as probes for cancer imaging [2].
With our technology platform, Creative Biolabs provides high-quality aptamer screening services for cells.
We committed to help our customers obtain high-quality aptamers more efficiently. If you are interested in this service, please contact us for more details.
Creative Biolabs provides the most comprehensive services for aptamer development projects. Our cutting-edge technology allows our researchers to fulfill your requirement from various aspects and to offer the most suitable solution for your project.
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