In the few years since the introduction of peptide nucleic acid, or PNA (P.E. Ni et al., Science 254:1497-1500, 1991)-a nucleic acid analog with a peptide rather than sugar-phosphate backbone-no less than 200 papers detailing some 25 different applications of the technology have been published. Antisense inhibition, strand invasion, PCR clamping, all manner of hybridizations, and even the routine detection of single base changes in DNA are but a few of the proven uses of PNA. PerSeptive Biosystems now offers a range of products to assist in the production of PNA probes: Expedite PNA solid-phase chemistry and software upgrades to enable the synthesis of PNA on PerSeptive's Expedite DNA 8909 Nucleic Acid Synthesis System, PNA Fmoc and t-Boc monomers and PNA synthesis reagents, and custom PNA synthesis.
Metaphase chromosomes from normal human lymphocytes after hybridization with Cy3 labeled PNA (orange/yellow) with DAPI staioned chromosomes. Photo courtesy of Peter M. Lansdorp. ...
