the present invention is illustrated in further details by the following non - limiting examples . correlation between the efficiency of microarray dna hybridisation and the length of the 5 ′ overhang of captured ermb amplicon strands . twenty - mer oligonucleotide probes bearing a 5 ′ amino - linker were synthesised by biosearch technologies ( novato , calif ., usa ). capture probe sequences used in the present invention are described in table 1 . the amino linker modification allowed covalent attachment of probes onto aldehyde - coated glass slides ( cel associates , pearland , tex ., usa ). oligonucleotide probes were diluted 2 - fold in arrayit ™ microspotting solution plus ( telechem international , sunnyvale , calif ., usa ) to a final concentration of 5 μm . oligonucleotides were spotted in triplicate using a virtek sddc - 2 arrayer ( bio - rad laboratories , hercules , calif ., usa ) with smp3 pins from telechem international . after spotting , slides were dried overnight , washed by immersion in 0 . 2 % sodium dodecyl sulfate ( sds ; laboratoire mat , quebec , qc , canada ) for 2 min , and rinsed in ultrapure water for 2 min . slides were boiled in ultrapure water for 5 min for washing out the unbound oligonucleotides . imine bonds between the glass surface and probes were reduced to a stable amide link by immersion for 20 min into a sodium borohydride solution ( 1 g sodium borohydride ; sigma , st . louis , mo ., usa ), 300 ml phosphate - buffered saline ( pbs ; also from sigma ), and 100 ml ethanol . slides were then washed in 0 . 2 % sds for 1 min and rinsed in ultrapure water for 1 min . slides were finally dried by centrifugation for 5 min under vacuum with a savant speedvac ™ plus ( thermo savant , n . y ., usa ) and stored in a dry oxygen - free and dark environment . all above chemical treatments of the slides were performed at room temperature . fluorescent dyes ( label ) were incorporated during pcr amplification . cy3 or cy5 dutp ( amersham biosciences , baie d &# 39 ; urfé , qc , canada ) were mixed at concentrations of 0 . 02 μm in a 50 - μl pcr mixture containing 0 . 05 mm datp , 0 . 05 mm dctp , 0 . 05 mm dgtp , 0 . 02 mm dttp , 5 mm kcl , 1 mm tris - hcl ( ph 9 . 0 ), 0 . 01 % triton x - 100 , 2 . 5 mm mgcl2 , 0 . 5 unit of taq dna polymerase ( promega , madison , wis ., usa ), 1 ng purified genomic dna , and 0 . 2 μm of each of the two primers . to test the effect of oligonucleotide probe position on the captured target dna strand on hybridisation efficiency , we amplified by pcr two overlapping portions ( 402 and 433 bp ) of the staphylococcus aureus ermb gene ( fig1 ). the ermb gene was amplified from genomic dna isolated from the erythromycin - resistant s . aureus strain ccri - 1277 . the 402 - bp product was produced using primers ermb225 and ermb601 , while the 433 - bp product was amplified by pcr using primers ermb109 and ermb512 ( table 1 ). thermal cycling for pcr amplification ( 180 s at 94 ° c ., followed by 40 cycles of 5 s at 95 ° c ., 30 at 55 ° c ., and 30 s at 72 ° c .) was carried out on an mj research ptc - 200 dna engine ® thermal cycler ( bio - rad laboratories ). pcr products were purified using the qiaquick ® pcr purification kit ( qiagen , mississauga , on , canada ). the dye incorporation was measured with an ultrospec 2000 spectrophotometer ( amersham biosciences ) at 550 nm for cy3 and at 650 nm for cy5 . concentration of the amplified product was determined at 260 nm using the ultrospec 2000 . asymmetric pcr was performed using the pcr conditions described above , except that the upper strand of the 433 - bp product was obtained using a 20 : 1 ratio of ermb109 and ermb512 primers , respectively ( fig1 ). an asymmetrical pcr was performed to produce the lower strand using a 20 : 1 ratio of ermb512 and ermb109 , respectively ( fig1 ). each asymmetric pcr was verified on a 1 . 5 % agarose gel to ensure the production of single - stranded dna and quantified using the ultrospec 2000 at 260 nm . the concentration of single - stranded dna was adjusted to 1 pm and hybridised to the microarray to confirm the absence of the complementary strand . prehybridisation and hybridisation were performed in 15 × 13 mm hybriwell ™ self - sticking hybridisation chambers ( grace bio - labs , bend , oreg ., usa ). microarrays were first prehybridised for 30 min at room temperature with 1 × hybridisation solution ( 6 × standard saline phosphate - edta [ sspe ; em science , gibbstown , n . j ., usa ], 1 % bovine serum albumin [ bsa ], 0 . 01 % polyvinylpyrrolidone [ pvp ], 0 . 01 % sds , and 25 % formamide [ all from sigma ]). cy - dutp - labeled pcr products were denatured at 95 ° c . for 5 min and then quickly chilled on ice . five microliters of denatured labeled products were mixed with 10 μl of 2 × hybridisation buffer ( 12 × sspe , 2 % bsa , 0 . 02 % pvp , and 0 . 02 % sds ) and 5 μl formamide ( final concentration of 25 %). prehybridisation solution was removed from the chamber and replaced by the labeled pcr products resuspended in hybridisation solution . the hybridisation was carried out at 22 ° c . for 15 min and up to 16 h . after hybridisation , microarrays were washed with 2 × sspe containing 0 . 1 % sds for 5 min at room temperature and rinsed once with 2 × sspe for 5 min . microarrays were dried by centrifugation at 1350 × g for 3 min . slides were scanned using a scanarray ® 4000xl confocal scanner ( packard bioscience biochip technologies , billerica , mass ., usa ), and fluorescent signals were analyzed using its software . we tested whether the region of the product targeted by an oligonucleotide capture probe influenced hybridisation efficiency . to achieve this goal , we initially used the ermb bacterial antibiotic resistance gene as genetic target . this gene encodes an adenine n - 6 - methyltransferase , which confers resistance to macrolides , lincosamides , and streptogramin b ( roberts et al ., 1999 , antimicrob . agents chemother ., 43 : 2823 - 2830 ). we generated two overlapping ermb pcr products , each targeted by six 20 - mer capture probes located at different areas of the products ( fig1 ). three of these probes ( a - s - ermbh272 , a - s - ermbh370 , and a - s - ermbh459 ) were designed to be complementary to the lower strand of both products , while the three other probes ( a - s - ermbh272a , a - s - ermbh370a , and a - s - ermbh459a ) targeted the same region but hybridised to the upper strand of both products . for these perfectly complementary oligonucleotides , both strands have the same tm and secondary structure , and have also been shown to behave identically for hybridisation in solution ( rafalski , 1988 , anal . biochem ., 173 : 383 - 386 ). therefore , variations in the performance of hybridisation between capture probes targeting the same region located on the opposite strand of a product may be attributed to a bias correlated with the efficiency of hybridisation onto solid support . the cy3 - labeled 402 - and 433 - bp products were hybridised overnight to the ermb array that contained the six different capture probes ( fig1 ). after washing and analysis , it was observed that the fluorescence signal for each capture probe after a 16 hours hybridisation was not identical . plotting the fluorescence intensities of hybridisation against the regions of the product recognized by capture probes revealed a correlation between the fluorescence intensity and the length of the free 5 ′ overhanging portion of the captured strand ( fig2 ). for each of the six capture probes , the strongest hybridisation signal was always observed for the probe targeting a region closest to the 5 ′ end of the upper or lower targeted strand . these probes hybridised the closest to the 5 ′ end of the complementary strand of the product , thus leaving the shortest overhanging 5 ′ end . both target ermb products ( 402 - and 433 - bp ) behaved similarly with respect to fluorescence intensity and position of the capture probe . also , no significant difference was observed between the upper and lower strands . this is illustrated in fig2 b by hybridisation with oligonucleotides a - s - ermbh370 of the 433 - bp product which is 151 nucleotides from the 5 ′ end , and a - s - ermbh370a of the 402 - bp product which is 146 nucleotides from the 5 ′ end , showing that when the 5 ′ overhang lengths were similar , the fluorescence intensities were also similar regardless of the product size or the target strand . despite the fact that for the same oligonucleotide capture probe the key determinant for hybridisation intensity appears to be the length of the 5 ′ overhang of the hybridised target dna strand , some probes worked better than others . for example , probe a - s - ermbh272a ( 5 ′ overhang length of 48 nucleotides ) produced a hybridisation signal six times stronger than probe a - s - ermbh459 ( 5 ′ overhang length of 62 nucleotides ). one explanation may be that the area covered by probe a - s - ermbh459 may be less available for hybridisation or less stable once hybridised than the area covered by probes a - s - ermbh272 and a - s - ermbh272a ( fig2 ). this behavior may be attributed either to the secondary structure of the target strand or to thermodynamic properties of the probes . it is salient to point out that the ag of the secondary structure from probe a - s - ermbh459 is − 14 . 2 kcal / mol , which represents a much higher energy than that for the other probes used in this study ( i . e . − 5 . 3 kcal / mol for probe a - s - ermbh272 and − 3 . 5 kcal / mol for probe a - s - ermbh370 ). nonetheless , even if probe a - s - ermbh459 gave a lower hybridisation signal , its intensity correlated with the length of the 5 ′ overhang ( fig2 c ). thus , capture probes ( p ) targeting ( able to bind ) the 5 ′ end of the captured target strand ( t *) gave strong and reproducible hybridisation signals , while probes targeting ( able to bind ) the 3 ′ extremity of the captured target strand gave no or very weak hybridisation signals after overnight hybridisation . one plausible explanation is that t * hybridised by its 3 ′ end is less stable than the same strand hybridised closer to its 5 ′ end . to verify this hypothesis , hybridisation kinetics were assessed by hybridising the 433 - bp labeled products with the ermb array for 15 , 30 , 60 , 180 and 960 min ( 16 h ). probes targeting regions close to the 5 ′ end of either strand of the product showed a fluorescent signal increasing with hybridisation time ( fig3 , panels a , b and c ). probes targeting regions leaving a longer 5 ′ overhang of either strand of the products exhibited very different hybridisation kinetics ( fig3 , panels d , e and f ). indeed , we observed an increase of the hybridisation signal in the first 30 min of hybridisation , but thereafter fluorescence intensity decreased over time until it reached background levels . this kinetics of hybridisation during the first 30 minutes is also observed for probes targeting the 5 ′ end of the captured strand . it may be surmised that during the first 30 minutes of the reaction , local higher concentration of capture probe ( p ) favoured hybridisation of t * on p . this hybridisation behaviour appears to follow a classical equilibrium equation : where k1 is the hybridisation constant and k2 the dissociation constant . this hybridization kinetics suggests that the longer the hybridisation period the more important is the negative impact of a long 5 ′ overhang . the hybridisation kinetics following the first 30 minutes , which is dependent on the position of the probe on the captured strand , may be explained by the topology of the t * p duplex . when a probe recognises an area closer to the 3 ′ end of the captured target strand t *, most of the overhanging 5 ′ end of non hybridised dna is exposed to the liquid phase above the glass surface ( fig4 a ). on the other hand , when it hybridises to an area close to the 5 ′ end of the captured strand target , most of t * ( 3 ′ end ) is directed towards the glass surface ( fig4 b ). in the first conformation , the overhanging tail of t * may be available for reassociation with its complementary strand ; t ′, a process that may destabilises the probe - target duplex ( t * p ). to test the ability of the nonhybridised complementary strand ( t ′) to destabilise the t * p duplex , we carried out experiments with single - stranded products . microarrays were hybridised for 10 h with the amplified 433 - bp ermb product lower strand ( t *) generated by asymmetrical pcr . after washing out the nonhybridised t * still in solution ( t * free ), the hybridisation was carried out for an additional 16 h , either with hybridisation buffer only or with an equimolar amount of the complementary upper strand t ′. in the presence of only single - stranded target dnas ( t *), the region at which the oligonucleotide probe hybridises no longer influences the hybridisation intensity ( fig5 ). for example , probe a - s - ermbh272 , which leaves a 5 ′ overhang of 249 nucleotides , hardly captures any of the target dna when the double - stranded product is used as target ( fig2 a ). however , this same probe efficiently captured the complementary single - stranded dna produced by asymmetrical pcr ( fig5 a ). similar results were observed for hybridisation with the upper product strand . the intensity of fluorescence decreased dramatically when the complementary t ′ lower ( anti - sense ) strand was included in the assay ( fig5 b ). the addition of the complementary strand t ′ reduced the intensity of hybridisation close to background levels , suggesting that t * p duplex destabilisation occurs in the presence of the complementary strand . displacement of t * from p by reassociation with t ′ probably proceeds through a sequential displacement pathway also known as a zipper effect ( reynaldo et al ., 2000 , j . mol . biol ., 297 : 511 - 520 ). hybridisation between the captured t * strand and its complementary strand t ′ in solution will occur first at the exposed overhang tail of the captured t * and will be followed by a branch migration mechanism towards the 3 ′ end . such a mechanism was used to build a dna - fuelled nanomolecular machine ( yurke et al ., 2000 , nature , 406 : 605 - 608 ; alberti et al ., 2003 , proc . natl . acad . sci . usa , 100 : 1569 - 1573 ). in those studies , the authors used the complementary dna strand ( called “ fuel dna ”) to close and open double - stranded dna structures . in the experiment described above , the complementary strand t ′ seems to act as the “ fuel ” dna , pulling the captured target strand t * from the probe ( fig4 c ). a longer 5 ′ overhang increases the probability of collision between the complex t * p and free t ′ and thus leads to a faster destabilisation effect . this may explain the hybridisation bias observed with long 5 ′ overhangs but does not explain why a short 5 ′ overhang end generates a hybridisation signal that increases over time ( fig3 a , b , c ). correlation between the efficiency of microarray dna hybridisation and the length of the 5 ′ overhang of captured tuf amplicon strands . material and methods are the same as those used in example 1 except that primers and capture probes targeting the tuf gene encoding the elongation factor tu were used ( see table 1 ). the tuf gene was amplified from genomic dna isolated from staphylococcus hominis subsp . hominis strain atcc 27844 . a 523 - bp product was produced using primers tshoh240 and tstag765 . thermal cycling for pcr amplification was as described in example 1 . fig8 shows the position of capture probes and pcr primers on the tuf gene pcr amplicons of 523 bp . arrows represent primers while dashed boxes represent 5 ′ amino - modified probes . brackets indicate the length in nucleotides of the 5 ′ overhanging tail of the target strand captured by each capture probe . results with the tuf gene were similar to those obtained with ermb ( fig6 ). capture probes gave stronger hybridisation signal when the 5 ′ overhanging tail was short and showed near background signals when the 5 ′ tail reached a length over 250 nucleotides for tuf ( fig6 ). thus , different capture probes seem to follow similar hybridisation methods , irrespective of the target sequences . to demonstrate that methods predicted in example 1 are applicable to other dna targets , we have tested the hybridisation efficiency of different capture probes ( according to the region to which they hybridise ) on the highly conserved tuf gene . as described in example 1 , capture probes gave stronger hybridisation signal when the 5 ′ overhang was short . in example 2 , capture probes showed near background signals when the 5 ′ overhang reached a length over 250 nucleotides ( fig6 ). correlation between the efficiency of microarray dna hybridisation and the length of the 5 ′ overhang of captured blashv amplicon strands . material and methods are the same as those used in example 1 except that primers and capture probes targeting the blashv gene encoding a β - lactamase were used ( see table 1 ). the blashv gene was amplified from genomic dna isolated from escherichia coli strain ccri - 1192 . different products were generated by combining the reverse primer shv763 with five different primers used to produce different lengths of 5 ′ overhangs : ( i ) primer shv604 amplified a 182 - bp product ; ( ii ) primer shv449 amplified a 337 - bp product ; ( iii ) primer shv368 amplified a 418 - bp product ; ( iv ) primer shv313 amplified a 473 - bp product ; and ( v ) primer shvseq71 amplified a 715 - bp product ( table 1 ). thermal cycling for pcr amplification was as described in example 1 . fig9 shows the position of pcr primers and a capture probe on the blashv gene pcr amplicons of 182 to 715 bp . arrows represent primers used for generating these amplicons . the single dashed box represents a 5 ′ amino - modified probe . brackets indicate the length in nucleotides of the 5 ′ overhanging tail of the target strand captured by the capture probe for each different pcr amplicons generated . results obtained with the blashv gene are shown in fig7 . products were amplified using the same reverse primer but using different forward primers . this allowed the amplification of products having a variable forward length , while its reverse length remained constant . after hybridisation of each product to the microarray , we plotted the signal in function of the length of the 5 ′ tail for the probes targeting the upper strand and in function of the length of the 3 ′ tail for the probes targeting the lower strand . the increase of the length of the 5 ′ tail reduced the signal ( correlation coefficient between − 0 . 66 and − 0 . 85 ), whereas the increase of the 3 ′ tail had no major effect on the hybridisation signal ( correlation coefficient between 0 . 12 and 0 . 20 ) ( fig7 ). those results suggest that , while the length of the 5 ′ tail has a significant impact on the hybridisation signal observed , the length of the 3 ′ tail seems less important ( data not shown ). therefore , the results for blashv were similar to those obtained with ermb in example 1 . capture probes targeting blashv gave stronger hybridisation signal when the 5 ′ overhanging tail was short and showed near background signals when the 5 ′ end reached a length over 600 nucleotides for blashv ( fig7 ). thus , different capture probes seem to follow similar hybridisation methods , irrespective of the target sequences . the hybridisation behaviour and efficiency of oligonucleotides arrayed onto a solid support has been investigated herein . as described herein , we observed that the position of a capture probe on a given product has an impact on the observed hybridisation signal . the hybridisation behaviour of a double - stranded product dna on short oligonucleotides immobilised by their 5 ′ end gave counter - intuitive and unexpected results . indeed , one would assume weaker hybridisation signal when a 5 ′ end immobilised probe binds the target molecule close to its 5 ′ end , because of steric hindrance caused by a longer 3 ′ overhanging tail . however , our results show that the increase of the 3 ′ end has no major effect on hybridisation signal , whereas the hybridisation signal strength is inversely correlated with the length of the 5 ′ overhanging tail of the target molecule when hybridised with a probe immobilised via its 5 ′ end . this hybridisation behavior may be explained by the topology of the t * p duplex . when a probe recognizes an area closer to the 3 ′ end of the captured target strand t *, most of the overhanging 5 ′ end of nonhybridised dna is exposed to the liquid phase above the glass surface ( fig4 ). on the other hand , when it hybridises to an area close to the 5 ′ end of the captured strand target , most of t * ( 3 ′ end ) is directed towards the glass surface . in the first conformation , the protruding tail of t * may be available for reassociation with its complementary strand ( t ′), a process that may destabilise the probe - target duplex ( t * p ) as shown when asymmetrical products were used . this hybridisation behavior may also be observed with 3 ′ immobilised probes , although probes anchored to a support by a 3 ′ end are not commonly used . displacement of t * from p by reassociation with t ′ may proceed through a sequential displacement pathway also known as a zipper effect ( reynaldo et al ., 2000 , j . mol . biol ., 297 : 511 - 520 ). hybridisation between the captured t * strand and its complementary strand t ′ in solution would occur first at the exposed overhang tail of captured t * and would be followed by a branch migration mechanism . such a mechanism was used recently to build a dna - fueled nanomolecular machine ( yurke et al ., 2000 , nature , 406 : 605 - 608 ; alberti and mergny , 2003 , proc . nat . acad . sci . usa , 100 : 1569 - 1573 ). in those studies , the authors used the complementary dna strand ( called fuel dna ) to close and open double - stranded dna structures . the complementary strand t ′ may act as the fuel dna , thereby pulling the captured target strand t * from the probe ( fig4 ). by using asymmetrical pcr , we have shown that the captured product strand is displaced by the target complementary strand t ′ independently of the area the probe targets on the product ( fig5 ). this suggests that some elements stabilise t * p when the hybridisations were performed in the presence of both t * and t ′. one possible model would be that t * free forms a quaternary complex ( t * t ′ t * free p ) with the ternary complex ( t ′ t * p ) captured on the glass surface . in accordance with the random walk theory for branch migration ( lee et al ., 1970 , j . mol . biol . 48 : 1 - 22 ), the branch point between t * t ′ and t ′ t * free duplexes of the t * t ′ t * free p complex may move in either direction . the random walk would continue until one of two helices becomes shorter than the minimum length of a stable duplex ( reynaldo et al ., 2000 , j . mol . biol ., 297 : 511 - 520 ). this means that the longer the duplex part of the helix is , the more likely it is to displace the other competing duplex ( e . g . if t * t ′ forms a longer helix , it would destabilise the complex t ′ t free and vice - versa ). a nucleation step would occur first with encounter between t ′ and the overhanging part of the captured t *. a double helix would rapidly be formed until it reaches the branch point made by the complex t * p ( radding et al ., 1977 , j . mol . biol ., 116 : 825 - 839 ). at that point , it is proposed that strand displacement by branch migration would start with the two complexes t * p and t ′ t *. simultaneously , the t * free would form a double - stranded helix with the overhanging part of t ′ associated with t * p ( fig4 c and d ), thereby forming an antagonist migration fork . when the 5 ′ overhang of t * dna is longer ( fig4 c ), the double helix formed with t ′ will be longer than the double helix formed between t * free and the overhanging part of t ′. branch mechanism competition between the two duplexes would be in favour of the reassociation of captured t * with t ′, pulling the target t * away from the probe p . in contrast , when the 5 ′ overhanging tail is short ( fig4 d ), the competing forming helix t * freet ′ would be long enough to favour reassociation of t * free with t ′, thereby depleting locally the t ′ and thus stabilising the t * p complex . over time , diffusion of t * in close proximity with free probes p , would feed the hybridisation of the target t * with the captured probe p , increasing the fluorescent signal ( fig3 a , b , c ). the results presented herein provide evidence that kinetic effects involving re - association of the complementary nucleic acid strand may be associated with destabilisation of the capture probe / nucleic acid target duplex and that this kinetic effect may be governed by the position of the complementary sequence on the targeted nucleic acids . the results presented herein therefore delineate key predictable parameters that govern the hybridisation efficiency of capture probes attached onto solid supports . these parameters allow selection of optimal capture probes for the detection of nucleotide polymorphisms . the kinetic effects and reassociation of the target to the pcr product &# 39 ; s complementary strand may lead to destabilisation of the capture probe / dna target duplex ( complex ) and that this kinetic effect may be governed by the position of the complementary sequence on the targeted nucleic acid . a correlation between the length of the overhang of the target and the efficiency of hybridization has been demonstrated herein . evidence that the presence of the complementary strand is associated with the poor hybridisation efficiency of 5 ′ immobilised probes targeting the 3 ′ end of a product , thereby leaving a long 5 ′ overhang has also been evidenced herein . on the other hand , probes targeting a region of the target which is located toward the 5 ′ end of the same product , hybridised more efficiently . therefore , the hybridisation efficiency of oligonucleotides anchored onto a solid support has been found to be highly dependent of their location on a target single - stranded nucleic acid . the results presented herein show that capture probes anchored by their 5 ′ end and targeting a region that lies within about a 40 % portion of the 5 ′ end of the captured nucleic acid strand provide more efficient hybridisations as compared to those targeting the remaining 60 % portion at the 3 ′ end ( fig2 , 6 and 7 ). conversely , capture probes anchored by their 3 ′ end and targeting a region that lies within a 40 % portion of the 3 ′ end of the captured nucleic acid strand provide more efficient hybridisations as compared to those targeting the remaining 60 % portion at the 5 ′ end . evaluation of the hybridisation signal for each probe revealed an inverse correlation between the length of the free overhanging end ( either the 5 ′ end or the 3 ′ end depending on which end of the probe is anchored on the support ) of the target and the hybridisation signal intensity . therefore , hybridised targets having their longest portion ( e . g ., at least 60 %) proximal the solid support have been found to be more stable and to give a better ( more intense ) hydridisation signal . results presented herein teach methods for the efficient design of capture probes , which help to improve the sensitivity and specificity of microarray detection . methods used in the selection and design of probes , thus ensure efficient and sensitive detection of either target single - stranded nucleic acids or denatured double - stranded nucleic acids such as pcr amplicons . this study demonstrates the importance of choosing the appropriate nucleic acid region to ensure efficient and sensitive detection of a target such as single - stranded nucleotide - based target which may come into contact with a nucleotide sequence substantially complementary to the unhybridized portion of the target ( which extends away form the support ), or double - stranded dna fragments such as pcr products using short capture probes . this is particularly important for snp detection . in addition , efforts are ongoing to develop novel amplification and labeling systems for efficient production of single - stranded dna products that would circumvent the competition between complementary strands . although the present invention has been described hereinabove by way of embodiments thereof , it may be modified , without departing from the spirit and nature of the subject invention as defined in the appended claims .