The Concept of Multiple-Target Anti-miRNA Antisense Oligonucleotide Technology

The multiple-target AMO technology or MT-AMO technology is an innovative strategy, which confers on a single AMO fragment the capability of targeting multiple miRNAs. This modified AMO is single-stranded 2′-O -methyl-modified oligoribonucleotides carrying multiple AMO units, which are engineered into a single unit and are able to simultaneously silence multiple-target miRNAs or multiple miRNA seed families. Studies suggest that the MT-AMO is an improved approach for miRNA target finding and miRNA function validation; it not only enhances the effectiveness of targeting miRNAs but also confers diversity of actions. It has been successfully used to identify target genes and cellular function of several oncogenic miRNAs and of the muscle-specific miRNAs (Lu et al., Nucleic Acids Res 37:e24–e33, 2009). This novel strategy may find its broad application as a useful tool in miRNA research for exploring biological processes involving multiple miRNAs and multiple genes, and the potential as an miRNA therapy for human disease such as cancer and cardiac disorders. This technology was developed by my research laboratory in collaboration with Yang’s group (Lu et al., Nucleic Acids Res 37:e24–e33, 2009), and it is similar but distinct from the miRNA Sponge technology developed by Sharp’s laboratory in 2007 (Ebert et al., Nat Methods 4:721–726, 2007) and modified by Gentner et al. (Nat Methods 6:63–66, 2009).