Trends in the Design and Development of Specific Aptamers Against Peptides and Proteins

Aptamers are single stranded oligonucleotides, comparable to monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) in selectivity and affinity and have significant strategic properties in design, development and applications more than mAbs. Ease of design and development, simple chemical modification and the attachment of functional groups, easily handling and more adaptability with analytical methods, small size and adaptation with nanostructures are the valuable characteristics of aptamers in comparison to large protein based ligands. Among a broad range of targets that their specific aptamers developed, proteins and peptides have significant position according to the number of related studies performed so far. Since proteins control many of important physiological and pathological incidents in the living organisms, particularly human beings and because of the benefits of aptamers in clinical and analytical applications, aptamer related technologies in the field of proteins and peptides are under progress, exclusively. Currently, there is only one FDA approved therapeutic aptamer in the pharmaceutical market, which is specific to vascular endothelial growth factor and is prescribed for age related macular degenerative disease. Additionally, there are several aptamers in the different phases of clinical trials. Almost all of these aptamers are specific to clinically important peptide or protein targets. In addition, the application of protein specific aptamers in the design and development of targeted drug delivery systems and diagnostic biosensors is another intersting field of aptamer technology. In this review, significant efforts related to development and applications of aptamer technologies in proteins and peptides sciences were considered to emphasis on the importance of aptamers in medicinal and clinical applications.     

Anti-inflammatory Activity of Bioactive Compounds from Microalgae and Cyanobacteria by Focusing on the Mechanisms of Action

Molecular Biology Reports - Microalgae and cyanobacteria are the potentially valuable source of bioactive compounds applied in the various industries and human usage in different fields of...     

Preliminary study on the effect of nucleolin specific aptamer–miRNA let-7d chimera on Janus kinase-2 expression level and activity in gastric cancer (MKN-45) cells

Molecular Biology Reports - Recently, much attention has been focused on the use of miRNAs in cancer treatment. The role of proto-oncogene Janus kinase-2 (JAK-2) in proliferation and survival of...     

A comparative study of the bispecific monoclonal antibody,blinatumomab expression in CHO cells and E. coli

Abstract

The “bispecifics” market improved over the past decade due to the development of many technological platforms including bispecific T cell engagers (BiTEs). The approval of blinatumomab, the most advanced bispecific T-cell engager (BiTE) in clinical trials, can be a significant milestone in the development of bispecific antibodies. Both Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells and E. coli strain are considered as the most widely used hosts for the large-scale production of therapeutic monoclonal antibodies. Since both of the economic and qualitative aspects of protein production are important in industry, selection of a suitable protein expression system is very critical. The BsAb gene was cloned into the expression vectors FC550A-1, pcDNA3.1 (+), and PET22b and 6?×?His-tagged BsAb then purified on a Ni-NTA chromatography column. Both SDS–PAGE and Western blotting analysis of the purified protein demonstrated that blinatumomab was successfully expressed as a 55?kDa in both expression systems. The antigen-binding properties of blinatumomab were compared in the mammalian system versus Escherichia coli. The results showed that the purified antibody from a mammalian expression system has better binding activity than the one from E. coli host.