COMPOSITIONS AND METHODS FOR DETECTING TARGET NUCLEIC ACID SEQUENCES UTILIZING ADJACENT SEQUENCE-ENZYME MOLECULES

摘要

Briefly stated, the present invention provides novel compositions and methods for detecting target nucleic acid sequences utilizing adjacent sequence-enzyme molecules. Within one aspect of the present invention, oligonucleotide-enzyme fusion molecules are provided, comprising an enzyme capable of cleaving scissile linkages and an oligonuleotide having the structure (NA1)x-S2-(NA2)y wherein NA1 and NA2 are nucleic acid sequences, is a scissile nucleic acid linkage, x, y, and z are integers from 1 to 1,000 and n is an integer from 1 to 10.