Abstract
Due to the misuse of antibiotics, multi-drug resistant (MDR) bacteria have become more rampant in our society; these MDR have given rise to diseases that are not readily curable. One such agent is the Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex, which is a causative agent of tuberculosis (TB). Timely diagnostics of the bacterial infection and detection of bacterial drug-susceptibility profiles helps to initiate the necessary treatment in a timely fashion and to limit transmission of the disease. For more affordable detection of bacterial diseases, such as TN, tag-free split aptamer probes are advantageous. This proposal aims at designing split aptamer probes for detection of point mutations in the rpoB and katG genes of M. tuberculosis that are associated with resistance to two front-line antibiotics – rifampin and isoniazid, respectively, which causes MDR-TB. The probes will be designed and tested with synthetic oligonucleotide mimics of the bacterial genes in terms of their limit of detection and selectivity in discriminating the targets with single-nucleotide substitutions.
Thesis Completion
2021
Semester
Spring
Thesis Chair/Advisor
Gerasimova, Yulia
Co-Chair
Xia, Xiaohu
Degree
Bachelor of Science (B.S.)
College
College of Sciences
Department
Chemistry
Degree Program
Biochemistry
Language
English
Access Status
Open Access
Release Date
11-1-2021
Recommended Citation
Beaton, Shannon A., "Characterization of a Label-free Fluorescent Assay for Point Mutation Discrimination Based on Split Aptamer Probes" (2021). Honors Undergraduate Theses. 1052.
https://stars.library.ucf.edu/honorstheses/1052