{"id":236906,"date":"2025-10-28T07:18:59","date_gmt":"2025-10-28T11:18:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=236906"},"modified":"2025-10-28T15:25:44","modified_gmt":"2025-10-28T19:25:44","slug":"rna-tech-could-make-fast-test-for-alzheimers-disease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2025\/10\/rna-tech-could-make-fast-test-for-alzheimers-disease\/","title":{"rendered":"RNA Tech Could Make Fast Test for Alzheimer’s Disease"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the most frightening things about Alzheimer\u2019s disease is how difficult it is to diagnose early. Now, University of Connecticut researchers report two fast tests for early markers of the disease in the journal Biosensors<\/a>, and in the upcoming Dec. 1 issue of Biosensors and Bioelectronics.<\/a>These techniques could one day be used to quickly identify many illnesses right in the doctor\u2019s office.<\/p>\n

Alzheimer\u2019s disease is the most common cause of age-related dementia, accounting for 60% to 80% of cases. It first manifests as forgetfulness and confusion, but as the disease progresses, Alzheimer\u2019s can cause difficulties with basic activities including swallowing and walking. There is evidence that Alzheimer\u2019s begins much earlier than the symptoms do– as much as 20 years, according to the Alzheimer\u2019s Association\u2014but currently there is no easy way to test for the disease in these early, silent stages.<\/p>\n

UConn chemists Jim Rusling, Jessica Rouge, and their colleagues at UConn Health Center on Aging have developed a fast, low-cost test for Alzheimer\u2019s disease markers. The test puts a small sample of blood plasma through an array that recognizes microRNA molecules associated with Alzheimer\u2019s disease.<\/p>\n

The two tests cleverly combine several technologies. The first is CRISPR CAS13A, part of a family of bacterial proteins that are famously used to edit genes. CAS13A acts like a scissors, snipping up ribonucleic acid (RNA). A chemical trigger (bits of RNA associated with Alzheimer\u2019s disease processes) causes CAS13A to light up a tiny dye molecule. The dye molecules use either fluorescence or electrochemoluminescence to glow.<\/p>\n

\"Graphics
(Contributed illustration)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The researchers made a tray with 96 tiny wells (see image) for the fluorescence detection. The tray was made out of a special 3D-printed material that anchors molecules attaching CAS13A into the wells. Each CAS13A molecule was attached to a strand of test RNA that exactly complemented a specific Alzheimer\u2019s RNA biomarker. If the RNA found its matching complement in the sample, it would bind it, triggering the CAS13A to snip up all the RNA around it\u2014including RNA masking the dye. The unmasked dye then fluoresced and\u00a0revealed the presence of the Alzheimer\u2019s marker. A similar strategy with used for ECL detection, except a small array was developed to detect 3 RNA biomarkers at once.<\/p>\n

\u201cOver the long term, we\u2019d like to come up with a single assay that could monitor multiple types of blood biomarkers for early Alzheimer\u2019s,\u201d Rusling says. The team hopes to continue, collaborating with researchers at UConn Health\u2019s Center on Aging to test more patient samples and follow them over time to see how well the test predicts Alzheimer\u2019s disease.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With Alzheimer’s beginning well before symptoms appear, early detection would be a crucial benefit for patients and doctors<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":226873,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2283,2226,2460,2231,2648,2076,2235,179,2227],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[1899],"class_list":["post-236906","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aging","category-clas","category-faculty","category-health-well-being","category-blue-research","category-research","category-today-homepage","category-uconn-health","category-uconn-edu-homepage"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-11 06:25:38","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236906","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/79"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=236906"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236906\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":237151,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236906\/revisions\/237151"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/226873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=236906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=236906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=236906"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=236906"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=236906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}