Strand Displacement Strategies for Biosensor Applications

DNA has many unique properties beyond encoding genetic information, one of which is its physicochemical stability based on Watson-Crick base pairing. Differences in sequence complementarity between multiple DNA strands can lead to the strand displacement reaction (SDR). SDRs have been regularly applied in synthetic biology, drug delivery, and, importantly, biosensing. SDR-based biosensors have high controllability, high sensitivity, and low interference, and can be used for multiplexed detection. Such biosensors have been demonstrated to detect nearly every class of biomolecule. As the field continues to mature, such platforms can be used as an integral tool for the manipulation of biomolecular reactions, bringing biosensors one step closer to the ultimate goal of point-of-care systems.