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Analytical chemistry

Clamping down on cancer detection

Nature Chemistry volume 7, pages 541–542 (2015)Cite this article

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An electrochemical clamp assay that enables the rapid and sensitive detection of nucleic acids containing single base mutations has now been developed. It has been shown to differentiate between cancer patient samples featuring a specific mutation, and controls from healthy donors or other cancer patients, all directly in unprocessed serum.

Electrical and electrochemical sensors have been touted as a particularly promising class of next-generation clinical diagnostics due to a number of key advantages1,2,3. Importantly, such sensors facilitate the multiplexed, simultaneous detection of various analytes at low concentrations and over a broad range of conditions. In addition, the targets of interest typically do not require labelling, greatly simplifying sample handling and processing, especially when only small amounts of material are available. Furthermore, electrical strategies in general allow for data to be collected and interpreted rapidly and in real time by minimally trained operators in virtually any setting. However, despite recent impressive progress in the field of electrochemical sensors, the detection of many clinically relevant targets from unprocessed patient samples remains quite challenging.

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Figure 1: The design of the electrochemical clamp assay enables the rapid, specific and sensitive detection of nucleic acids containing a single base mutation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Alon A. Gorodetsky is in the Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, California 92697, USA,

    Alon A. Gorodetsky

  2. Irina A. Gorodetskaya is a scientific advisor for the Gorodetsky Group,

    Irina A. Gorodetskaya

Authors
  1. Irina A. Gorodetskaya
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  2. Alon A. Gorodetsky
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Correspondence to Alon A. Gorodetsky.

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Gorodetskaya, I., Gorodetsky, A. Clamping down on cancer detection. Nature Chem 7, 541–542 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/nchem.2290

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