Background

According to Hong Kong department of Health, the H3N2 flu outbreak in Hong Kong has been a cause for concern. 307 people died from this disease, which is even more than that in SARS outbreak in 2003. This influenza also can be a serious illness to the weak and frail or elderly, and may be complicated by bronchitis, chest infection or even death.

In our previous project, we made a nano-tweezer to detect nucleic acids target in E. coil. This 2D structure made use of the Guanine rich sequence to bind with E. coli target strand to form a G-quadruplex. The G-quadruplex will enhance the peroxidase activity of hemin and lead to the peroxidation of 2,2'-azino-bis(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid) (ABTS) giving a colorimetric signal. The degree of peroxidase activity indicates the concentration of E.coli.

Inspired by this technology, we want to make a 3 dimensional nanostructure to detect H3N2 virus. Hence, we want to use this as an example to demonstrate the possibility in using DNA Nanotechnology for diagnosis.

Hypothesis

First, we hypothesize that those eight DNA strands, which are designed by us and DNA strands are held by Watson-Crick base pairing, will self-assemble to form a cube, with the help of a thermal cycler. Second, we hypothesis our nano-cube can bind with H3N2 virus to form G-quadruplex and can show its peroxidase activity in the presence of hemin.

Graph

Objectives

1. We hope the DNA strands we designed can be self-assemble to form a cube.
2. The cube can bind with the target strand
3. The higher the concentration of H3N2 virus, the higher the colour intensity is.
4. The result can be shown in-vivo.