Skip to main content
Institute of Engineering in Medicine IEM
  1. IEM
  2. News and Events
  3. News
  4. News Archives
  5. Enter Overtaking RT-PCR, Could Isothermal Sequencing become the New Gold Standard for Sequencing?Title Here

Overtaking RT-PCR, Could Isothermal Sequencing become the New Gold Standard for Sequencing?

Blue DNA strand with rainbow graph sequencing data wrapped around it on black background

November 18, 2024 – With the age of quantitative expression, real-time PCR’s (RT-PCR) popularity has spread like wildfire among researchers, hailed as the most accurate measurement of gene expression today. Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the call for rapid sequencing was at its peak. However, the machinery’s drawbacks come with time and cost-intensive investment, leading to many wondering if there are alternative methodologies that can achieve the same results more efficiently.


Debashis Sahoo may have just found the answer to this problem. Utilizing isothermal sequencing, Sahoo found that for the gene CDX-2, a colorectal cancer prognosis marker, the isothermal sequencing was just as accurate as the gold standard that is RT-PCR. Not only that, isothermal sequencing was extremely easy to use and could be done at home– negating the need for expensive equipment purchases. This was an extremely big breakthrough for Sahoo and the field of sequencing as a whole. If mRNA could be measured from the comforts of your home, diagnostic tests like blood draws would become much easier for patients to conduct rather than needing to schedule to come into the clinic. 


Most diagnostic tests are done using protein-based assays, but there is a limitation to the antibodies for these assays. In the future, Sahoo predicts that mRNA diagnostics will become the leader in the diagnostic field. mRNA-based assays would be able to deconvolute data from a very small amount of material, as current blood tests require a lot of sample material.


Sahoo is currently optimizing ways to utilize neutrophils for cancer diagnostics. If a cancer patient is at home and is sick, they might not recover quickly or be in a state where travel to and from the clinic for a test is both feasible and safe. At-home testing would be a great solution for this issue, and allow for patients to feel comfortable during their treatment period.


Sahoo recently spoke at the October Macrophage-Directed Therapies Summit in Boston. To read more about Sahoo’s research, check out his recent paper here.

View older articles in our  News Archives.