Development of a dna aptamer against recombinant hazelnut allergen protein

Food allergy can be defined as an IgE mediated immune response against protein or glycoprotein based food antigens. Allergic consumers must avoid allergen protein containing foods. Declaration of any possible allergen ingredient in foodstuff is a legal obligation, in order to protect allergic consumers. ELISA, lateral flow immunosorbent assay and RT-PCR methods represent the most common available commerical kits for fast, reliable and in place detection of food allergen proteins. Owing to their advantages when compared to antibodies, biosensor applications of aptamers gained significant attention in last years. Hazelnut allergy is common in Europe, and DNA aptamers developed against hazelnut allergen proteins would have potential in such areas like allergen detection kit or biosensor development applications. In this master of science thesis, it was aimed to develop a DNA aptamer which is capable of binding to hazelnut allergen protein with high selectivity and affinity. To this aim, Cor a 11 and it homologue protein from peanut, Ara h 1 were purified after their recombinant production. Both proteins were immobilizedon magnetic beads and SELEX study was done consequently. Finally, aptamer sequences potentially bind to Cor a 11 protein with a high selectivity and affinity were determined.