Bioanalytical chemistry articles from across Nature Portfolio

Short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) are key volatile biomarkers in breath for non-invasive disease detection, but methanol-driven esterification during thermal desorption workflows can convert SCFAs into methyl esters, leading to substantial loss of parent acids and distorted biomarker measurements. Here, the authors show that this reaction occurs in the liquid phase and accelerates with higher temperatures and prolonged storage, highlighting the need for improved protocols to ensure accurate VOC-based diagnostics.

This Review introduces methods for enhancing the targeting ability of metal–organic frameworks (MOFs), reviews their applications when modified with different types of targeting molecules and provides guidance for the next-generation MOFs to achieve accurate cancer diagnosis and treatment.

Accurate single nucleotide variations (SNVs) detection is clinically vital, yet existing techniques can only detect SNVs at specific loci. Here, Mao et al present a new generalized CRISPR/Cas-based strategy, termed PRICE, to identify SNVs in miRNA sequences without sacrificing the sensitivity.

Biosynthetic colourants are sustainable alternatives to replace artificial dyes, but prediction of their optical properties remains challenging. Here, the authors develop a workflow combining message passing neural networks and excited state calculations to predict colour changes at different pH levels, offering a promising tool for designing eco-friendly dyes.

Analysing the sequence, concentration and sub-cellular location of RNA can provide insight into physiological processes and enable disease diagnosis. This issue draws together several articles describing chemical advances that can be applied to detect RNA.

Subtle mutations in the genome play key roles in both disease progression and pathogen evolution. Now, a fluorescent aptamer-based RNA switch has been shown to enable rapid and robust detection of single nucleotide mutations.

Human bodies have complex reactions to stress and anxiety. A recent study explores the effect of fear on our sensitivity to odours.

Forensic science is a mixture of specialties, including many chemistry subdisciplines, that focus on the idea of traces — marks that are remnants of past events. The findings should be affected by scene examination, time factors and context rather than an overreliance on the precision of the laboratory results.

We developed a high-throughput, unbiased strategy for the identification of endogenous biomolecular condensates by merging cell volume compression, sucrose density gradient centrifugation and quantitative mass spectrometry. We demonstrated the performance of this strategy by identifying both global condensate proteins and those responding to specific biological processes on a proteome-wide scale.

Cryptic halogenation reactions result in natural products with diverse structural motifs and bioactivities. However, these halogenated species are difficult to detect with current analytical methods because the final products are often not halogenated. An approach to identify products of cryptic halogenation using halide depletion has now been discovered, opening up space for more effective natural product discovery.