[Principles of creating biotransducers based on nucleic acid liquid crystals]

A brief concept of biosensors is presented. Structural peculiarities and properties of single- and double-stranded nucleic acids that are to be taken into account when creating sensing units for biosensors using different principles of molecular recognition are considered. General schemes of sensing units based on liquid-crystalline dispersions formed from low-molecular mass DNA, its complexes with "cross-linking" agents and from circular superhelical DNA molecules are described.