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Applications in RNA analysis

  Apostle technologies have been applied in many world-class R&D studies, clinical laboratory settings, and public health response and surveillance.

This page lists some of the examples in RNA analysis.

For a complete list of applications citing Apostle technologies, including publications and customer testimonials, see References

Apostle MiniMax Technology in Circulating Cell Free RNA Analysis

Combining cell-free RNA with cell-free DNA in liquid biopsy for hematologic and solid tumors. Maher Albitar, Hong Zhang, Ahmad Charifa, et al. Heliyon  9 (2023) e16261; May 16, 2023 

(Note: Apostle MiniMax technology is used in this study.) 

Abstract Current use of liquid biopsy is based on cell-free DNA (cfDNA) and the evaluation of mutations or methylation pattern. However, expressed RNA can capture mutations, changes in expression levels due to methylation, and provide information on cell of origin, growth, and proliferation status. We developed an approach to isolate cell-free total nucleic acid (cfDNA) and used targeted next generation sequencing to sequence cell-free RNA (cfRNA) and cfDNA as new approach in liquid biopsy. We demonstrate that cfRNA is overall more sensitive than cfDNA in detecting mutations. We show that cfRNA is reliable in detecting fusion genes and cfDNA is reliable in detecting chromosomal gains and losses. cfRNA levels of various solid tumor biomarkers were significantly higher (P < 0.0001) in samples from solid tumors as compared with normal control. Similarly, cfRNA lymphoid markers and cfRNA myeloid markers were all higher in lymphoid and myeloid neoplasms, respectively as compared with control (P < 0.0001). Using machine learning we demonstrate cfRNA was highly predictive of diagnosis (AUC >0.98) of solid tumors, B-cell lymphoid neoplasms, T-cell lymphoid neoplasms, and myeloid neoplasms. In evaluating the host immune system, cfRNA CD4:CD8B and CD3D:CD19 ratios in normal controls were as expected (median: 5.92 and 6.87, respectively) and were significantly lower in solid tumors (P < 0.0002). This data suggests that liquid biopsy combining analysis of cfRNA with cfDNA is practical and may provide helpful information in predicting genomic abnormalities, diagnosis of neoplasms and evaluating both the tumor biology and the host response.

(Methods section)  We used Apostle MiniMax High Efficiency cfRNA/cfDNA isolation kit and followed the recommended protocol. After extraction, half of the cfDNA was treated with DNase to obtain cfRNA and the other half was used for DNA studies. 


For a complete list of publications citing Apostle technologies, see Publications

Nature Communications just published a clinical study, including 2125 cancer patients, 9 cancer types, using the Apostle Minimax cfDNA technology. This study demonstrates the ability of its model to detect early-stage cancers using cfDNA, including those of pancreatic origin, with high sensitivity that is comparable to that of late-stage detection. Congratulations to this clinical research team. To date, the Apostle Minimax cfDNA technology has been used in 2 articles published in Nature Medicine, 1 in Nature Communications, 1 in Science Translational Medicine, 1 in PNAS, and over 50 scientific articles in different journals.