ORGN 308 |
| Dongsheng Liu and Shankar Balasubramanian. Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge, Lensfield Road, Cambridge, CB2 1EW, United Kingdom |
| The molecular recognition properties of DNA are sufficiently well understood to enable the self-assembly of defined structures and devices on the nanometer scale. DNA machines based on a competing hybridisation mechanism have been reported. These nanomachines are fuelled by complementary oligonucleotides and accumulate double stranded DNA waste products that poison the system. Here we show a molecular nanomachine that can undergo well defined conformational changes in structure driven by protonation. It is based on a four-stranded DNA structure, called the i-motif, that can be formed from sequences containing stretches of cytosine (C) residues. This molecular machine is fast and reversible, and exerts comparable forces in both strokes of its linear motion. Each working cycle only generates H2O and salt which are both non-toxic to the system. Multiple cycling of this machine was demonstrated.
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Molecular Recognition and Materials
8:00 AM-12:00 PM, Tuesday, August 24, 2004 Pennsylvania Convention Center -- 201B, Oral
Division of Organic Chemistry |
