Frequently Asked Questions

FANA ASO technology is a 2'-deoxy-2'-fluoro-beta-D-arabinose sugar modification on single stranded antisense oligonucleotides that can be used for RNA silencing and regulation experiments. The biggest advanatge of this 3rd generation ASO technology is that it FANA ASOs can be self-delivered and can be used both for cellular and animal studies (preclincal and translational studies).

FANAs have very high binding affinity and specificity for their RNA targets. FANAs can be used to degrade a wide variety of RNA targets (mRNA or lncRNA) using RNase H or act as steric blockers (miRNA inhibiton, translational control, exon skipping).

FANA oligos can be self-delivered without the use of any delivery agent. FANAs have high intracellular stability as well as high binding affinity to the target RNA forming very stable heteroduplex structures. Unlike conventional technologies, FANAs have high fidelity for the RNA target and highly reduced off target effects (no RISC associated off target effects). These attributes represent a more potent, efficient and cost effective solution in the RNA silencing and regulation space. Next generation FANA RNA silencing and regulation technology can be used to very efficiently knockdown or regulate a variety of genetic modalities, like mRNA, microRNA and long non-coding RNA.

FANA Products

• AUMsilence – for mRNA knockdown
• AUMantagomir – for miRNA silencing
• AUMmirblocker – for miRNA regulation*
• AUMlnc – for long non-coding RNA knockdown
• AUMblock – for translational blocking
• AUMsplice – for RNA splicing experiments
• AUMskip – for exon skipping experiments
• AUMprobe – for probing experiments

*FANA oligos designed to bind with the miRNA binding site in the 3’UTR (acting as steric blocker) thus preventing miRNA binding to its target, eventually upregulating the target.

FANA Applications

• mRNA knockdown (RNase H mediated knockdown)
• Regulation of microRNA. For example, as antagomirs for miRNA regulation
• Cleavage of microRNA
• Knock down of lncRNA and other non-coding RNA
• Exon skipping
• RNA splicing
• Translational control/blocking: Can act as steric blockers by hybridization with the target RNA and inhibit translation
• Can act as decoys by hybridization with the target RNA for genetic regulation
• Applications that require hybridization with nucleic acids especially RNA
• Can be used as probes for a variety of applications
• Can be used in clinical diagnostics for a variety of applications

No. FANA oligos can be self-delivered without the use of any delivery agent.

Yes. FANAs workwell in primary cells. FANA oligos can easily knockdown or regulate target RNA in hard to transfect cells (like primary cells, B-cells, T-cells, neurons etc.) and highly sensitive cells derived from patient samples.

Yes. FANAs can work in animal models.