ECHO-LNA Conjugates: Hybridization-Sensitive Fluorescence and Its Application to Fluorescent Detection of Various RNA Strands

Hybridization-sensitive fluorescent DNA probes containing the nucleotide units of locked nucleic acid (LNA) have been developed. Exciton-controlled hybridization-sensitive fluorescent oligonucleotide (ECHO) probes that incorporated LNA nucleotides achieved high thermostability of the hybrid with target RNA strands. The appropriately designed ECHO-LNA chimeric probes exhibited an effective on-off switching property of fluorescence depending on hybridization with RNA and facilitated fluorescent detection of the TAR RNA strand forming a hairpin structure and distinction of one base difference in PLAC4 RNA sequence.