In Vitro Selection and Characterization of a DNAzyme Probe for Diverse Pathogenic Strains of Clostridium difficile

Clostridium difficile frequently causes an infectious disease known as Clostridium difficile infection (CDI), and there is an urgent need for the development of more effective rapid diagnostic tests for CDI. Previously we have developed an RNA-cleaving fluorogenic DNAzyme (RFD) probe, named RFD-CD1, that is capable of detecting a specific strain of C. difficile but is too specific to recognize other pathogenic C. difficile strains. To overcome …