Functional nucleic acids in high throughput screening and drug discovery

In vitro selection can be used to generate functional nucleic acids such as aptamers and ribozymes that can recognize a variety of molecules with high affinity and specificity. Most often these recognition events are associated with structural alterations that can be converted into detectable signals. Several signaling aptamers and ribozymes constructed by both design and selection have been successfully utilized as sensitive detection reagents. Here we summarize the development of different types of signaling nucleic acids, and approaches that have been implemented in the screening format.