A binding-triggered hybridization chain reaction cascade multi-site activated CRISPR/Cas12a signal amplification strategy for sensitive detection of α-synuclein

Analyst. 2024 Jul 8;149(14):3725-3731. doi: 10.1039/d4an00453a.

Abstract

Alpha-synuclein (α-syn) is closely related to the pathological process of Parkinson's disease (PD). Sensitive detection of α-syn is important for the early diagnosis and disease progression monitoring of PD. Herein, we report a binding-triggered hybridization chain reaction (HCR) cascade multi-site activated CRISPR/Cas12a signal amplification strategy for sensitive detection of α-syn. In this method, antibody-DNA capture probes recognized α-syn and bound with it to increase the local effective concentrations of two DNA strands, promoting their hybridization to form a split HCR trigger. Then the trigger initiated an HCR to generate a long double-stranded structure which contained abundant periodically repeated Cas12a/crRNA target sequences. Finally, the Cas12a/crRNA recognized the target sequence in HCR products and then the cleavage activity toward fluorescent reporters was activated, leading to the recovery of appreciable fluorescence signals. Our method provided a detection limit as low as 9.33 pM and exhibited satisfactory applicability in human serum samples. In summary, this study provides a homogeneous strategy for convenient, sensitive, and accurate detection of α-syn, showing great potential in the early diagnosis of PD.

MeSH terms

  • Bacterial Proteins / chemistry
  • Bacterial Proteins / genetics
  • Biosensing Techniques / methods
  • CRISPR-Associated Proteins / chemistry
  • CRISPR-Cas Systems*
  • DNA Probes / chemistry
  • DNA Probes / genetics
  • Endodeoxyribonucleases / chemistry
  • Fluorescent Dyes / chemistry
  • Humans
  • Limit of Detection*
  • Nucleic Acid Amplification Techniques / methods
  • Nucleic Acid Hybridization*
  • Parkinson Disease / diagnosis
  • Spectrometry, Fluorescence / methods
  • alpha-Synuclein*

Substances

  • alpha-Synuclein
  • DNA Probes
  • Fluorescent Dyes
  • Bacterial Proteins
  • Cas12a protein
  • CRISPR-Associated Proteins
  • Endodeoxyribonucleases