Artificial nucleic acid backbones and their applications in therapeutics, synthetic biology and biotechnology

Abstract

The modification of DNA or RNA backbones is an emerging technology for therapeutic oligonucleotides, synthetic biology and biotechnology. Despite a plethora of reported artificial backbones, their vast potential is not fully utilised. Limited synthetic accessibility remains a major bottleneck for the wider application of backbone-modified oligonucleotides. Thus, a variety of readily accessible artificial backbones and robust methods for their introduction into oligonucleotides are urgently needed to utilise their full potential in therapeutics, synthetic biology and biotechnology.

The Medicinal Chemistry of Artificial Nucleic Acids and Therapeutic Oligonucleotides

“…The vast and extremely diverse array of chemically modified oligonucleotides is impossible to comprehensively present in a single review article. A number of reviews have been published on subareas of the topic, such as delivery [ 16 ], metabolism [ 17 ], or antisense use [ 18 , 19 ]. Here, we provide a thorough overview of the major types and latest versions of xeno nucleic acids that have been developed to date, briefly addressing the rationale behind the modifications and highlighting the impact of these modifications on physicochemical properties and biological function.…”