Tobin J. Hellyer

Strand displacement amplification: a versatile tool for molecular diagnostics

Strand displacement amplification is an isothermal process that permits 1010-fold amplification of a DNA target sequence in as little as 15 min. In the form of the BD ProbeTec™ ET System, strand displacement amplification was the first nucleic acid amplification technology to be coupled with real-time homogeneous fluorescence-based detection for routine application in the clinical laboratory. The isothermal nature of the reaction process offers distinct advantages with regard to the cost and simplicity of instrumentation, while a universal detection format permits the use of the same fluorescent detector probes across multiple analytes. This has important potential in the field of genetic analysis, in which disease predisposition and therapeutic efficacy are frequently determined by multiple nucleic acid markers.