EVALUATING THE SPECIFICITY OF CANCER CELL TARGETING PEPTIDES FOR APPLICATIONS IN CANCER DIAGNOSTICS.

Cancer is a disease most often associated with poor prognosis. During the development of the disease, cells acquire genetic mutations which result in changes in bio-molecules (DNA and protein), thus altering normal functioning of cells. These bio-molecules can thus serve as biomarkers for the diagnosis of cancer and can also facilitate the early detection of cancer. Antibodies labelled with organic fluorophores are typically used in immunohistochemistry techniques to screen cancerous tissue for the presence of biomarkers. More recently, researchers started to use cancer specific peptides (e.g LYP-1, RGD,) rather than antibodies for this purpose. Advantages of peptides include high affinity to their binding target, rapid accumulation at target sites and the ability to evade the immune system. Fluorescent nanocrystals or quantum dots are emerging as nanoparticles that can replace organic fluorophores. Several properties of quantum dots make these nanoparticles an ideal application in the detection of cancer related biomarkers. These include size tunable fluorescence emission, resistance to photobleaching as well as high quantum yields that result in bright emission of fluorescence. The aim of this research project was to investigate the specific binding of selected peptides to cancer cells using functionalized quantum dots. Since the cost of synthetic peptides are so high, the aim of this study was also to expres