Autocatalytic Signal Amplification via Orthogonal Recognition of Dual Proteins on the Surface of Serum Extracellular Vesicles for Precise Diagnosis of Prostate Cancer.

This study presents a novel dual-protein orthogonal triggered autocatalytic signal amplification (DOTASA) strategy to improve the specificity of early prostate cancer (PCa) detection.

Key features of the method include:

• Targeting extracellular vesicles (EVs): Specifically those expressing CD63 and prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) from serum samples.
• Use of catalytic hairpin assembly (CHA) and fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) to achieve ultrasensitive detection.
• High specificity: The approach distinguishes early PCa from benign prostatic hyperplasia with 100% specificity, outperforming conventional PSA testing, which has 73.3% specificity.
• Diagnostic accuracy: Demonstrated by an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.9956.

This technique offers a rapid and highly specific diagnostic tool for early PCa screening.