Nucleic acid aptamers, which are generated by a novel technique called SELEX(systematic evolution of ligands by exponential enrichment), have recently atracted signiicant atention in the ield of early detection and treatment of cancer based on their numerous merits, such as high ainity, high speciicity,small size, litle immunogenicity, stable structures, and ease of chemical modiication. Furthermore,aptamers can gain more lexibility as cancer cell targeting tools when conjugated to nanomaterials,including metallic nanoparticles, carbon nanomaterials, DNA nanodevices, and polymeric nanoparticles.We discuss the progress achieved in cancer diagnosis and therapy through the conjugation of cell-SELEX-based aptamers with diferent nanomaterials.
Nucleic acid aptamers, which are generated by a novel technique called SELEX (systematic evolution of ligands by exponential enrichment), have recently attracted significant attention in the field of early detection and treatment of cancer based on their numerous merits, such as high affinity, high specificity, small size, little immunogenicity, stable structures, and ease of chemical modification. Furthermore, aptamers can gain more flexibility as cancer cell targeting tools when conjugated to nanomaterials, including metallic nanoparticles, carbon nanomaterials, DNA nanodevices, and polymeric nanoparticles. We discuss the progress achieved in cancer diagnosis and therapy through the conjugation of cell-SELEX-based aptamers with different nanomaterials.