December 4, 2014 14:15 PSP Book - 9in x 6in 03-Serge-Cosnier-c03
Chapter 3
Electrochemical Nucleic Acid
Aptamer–Based Biosensors
Ilaria Palchetti and Marco Mascini
Dipartimento di Chimica, Universit
`
a degli Studi di Firenze, Sesto Fiorentino (Fi), Italy
ilaria.palchetti@unifi.it
Aptamers are nucleic acid ligands that can be generated against
amino acids, drugs, proteins, and other molecules. They are isolated
from a large random library of synthetic nucleic acids by an iterative
process of binding, separation, and amplification, called systematic
evolution of ligands by exponential enrichment (SELEX). In this
chapter, the selection procedure and peculiar characteristics of these
innovative biomolecules are described. The advancements of a wide
range of