I see the light!
This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science.
Treating disease can be like a shot in the dark. If only we could see better. How can we brighten things up?
Enter, Lila Halpers and team at the University of California, Irvine.
They looked at Ribonucleic Acids – the blueprint for proteins – and said “let’s stick a light on that.”
They developed an “R-N-A lantern” – combining R-N-A and protein to produce light.
When bound to R-N-A, the light-producing protein components aligned more accurately. In fact, RNA lanterns are SEVENTEEN times brighter than with proteins alone! Amazingly, the RNA lantern shines bright enough to be seen through the tissue of live mice!
By illuminating R-N-A, we may even develop novel biomarkers to identify disease based on R-N-A movement!
Now, let’s give R-N-A some horns to go with those headlights!
Reference: Halbers, L. P., Cole, K. H., Ng, K. K., Fuller, E. B., Chan, C. E. T., Callicoatte, C., Metcalfe, M., Chen, C. C., Barhoosh, A. A., Reid-McLaughlin, E., Kent, A. D., Torrey, Z. R., Steward, O., Lupták, A., & Prescher, J. A. (2024). A modular platform for bioluminescent RNA tracking. Nature Communications, 15(1), 9992. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-54263-5