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Description
Magnetic nanoparticles have been the subject of much research with their unique properties such as size in the nanoscale and the existence of high magnetic moment which bring a wide range of their applications. It is their ability to respond to an external magnetic field that enables their motion control. Their application in biomedicine is interesting, where they show promise as drug carriers, as heat sources in magnetic particle hyperthermia for cancer therapy, in MRI imaging techniques and also in separation techniques using an external magnetic field [1].
At the same time, separation techniques are notoriously time-consuming and technically demanding, which often brings negative impacts in the process of diagnosis and therapy of various viral and bacterial diseases. Also, the specificity of various viral and bacterial diseases limits the possibilities of using conventional separation techniques due to the low concentration of the captured target substances. One of the new approaches in this field is magnetic separation using magnetic nanoparticles [2].
The thesis deals with the application of magnetic nanoparticles as nucleic acid separation reagents in RT-PCR assays. One of the main objectives of the work is to design such nanoparticle systems that, by their specific properties such as shape, magnetic moment magnitude, or the presence of ligand on the nanoparticle surface, would accelerate the separation of nucleic acids and increase the amount of bound genetic material during RT-PCR testing. The potential of magnetic nanoparticles to bind DNA/RNA molecules is investigated on SiO$_2$-coated Fe$_3$O$_4$-type nanoparticles with a specific organic ligand on the surface. Also, the work is devoted to the preparation of star-shaped nanoparticles, or cubic nanoparticles which by their specific shape can bind DNA/RNA molecules more efficiently compared to spherical nanoparticles. Our synthesized nanoparticles have been investigated for their ability to bind nucleic acids. This type of nanoparticles is also characterized in terms of structure, morphology and magnetic properties.
