Tag Archives: Youli Zu

Aptamers and theranostics (theragnostics)

A popular concept in some circles, theranostics (sometimes called theragnostics) is a conflation of the words ‘therapeutics’ and ‘diagnostics’. A Feb. 17, 2015 news item on Nanowerk features the use of aptamers as theranostic agents,

Aptamers are composed of short RNA or single-stranded DNA sequences that, when folded into their unique 3D conformation, can bind to their targets with high specifi city and affinity. Although functionally similar to protein antibodies, oligonucleotide aptamers offer several advantages over protein antibodies in biomedical and clinical applications.

Through the enhanced permeability and retention effect, nanomedicines can improve the therapeutic index of a treatment and reduce side effects by enhancing accumulation at the disease site. However, this targets tumors passively and, thus, may not be ideal for targeted therapy.

To construct ligand-directed “active targeting” nanobased delivery systems, aptamer-equipped nanomedicines have been tested for in vitro diagnosis, in vivo imaging, targeted cancer therapy, theranostic approaches, sub-cellular molecule detection, food safety, and environmental monitoring.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Aptamers and Their Applications in Nanomedicine by Hongguang Sun and Youli Zu. Small DOI: 10.1002/smll.201403073 Article first published online: 11 FEB 2015

© 2015 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

This paper is behind a paywall.

Here’s an illustration of the theranostic concept,

© Wiley

© Wiley

I have a bit more about aptamers in an Oct. 25, 2011 post featuring an interview with professor Maria DeRosa at the University of Ottawa.