Lifeboat Foundation

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Indian scientists have designed high precision DNA probes for breast cancer detection, which they claim can bring down costs of diagnostics ten-fold.

Researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology — Guwahati relied on ‘magic bullets’ of science, a class of molecules called aptamers, that can bind to virtually any molecule, clasping it in a firm lock-and-key fit.

“Our team has found an alternative way to detect breast cancer. We have synthesised a special type of aptamer which has high specificity towards estrogen receptor alpha positive breast carcinomas. The aptamer recognises and binds to the receptor even in minute quantities,” Arghya Sett, lead author of the study, told IANS.