Recent advances in oligonucleotide synthesis and their applications

Short synthetic oligonucleotides are finding wide variety of applications in area of genomics and medicinal chemistry. Since the isolation of nucleic acids to the mapping of human genome, chemical synthesis of nucleic acids has undergone tremendous advancements. Further improvements in this area such as, introduction of high throughput synthesizers, better coupling reagents, improved polymer supports, newer sets of protecting groups for exocyclic amino groups of nucleic bases and introduction of universal polymer supports have completely revolutionized the entire field of nucleic acids chemistry. Most of these developments have been targeted to assemble these molecules more efficiently in a cost-effective manner and rapidly. Preparation of oligonucleotide conjugates has further helped in identifying the newer areas of their applications. A number of conjugates with biological and abiological ligands have been discussed in this article along with their possible wide spectrum of applications. Recently developed microarray technology, which refers to attachment of short oligonucleotides on a solid/polymeric surface, has proved to be useful for screening of genetic mutations, study of polymorphism, as diagnostics, etc. The major developments in these areas are presented in the review.