DNA nanorobotic arm array

FromScience Daily, more on Ned Seemans DNA nanorobotic arms.


NYU chemistry professor Nadrian C. Seeman and his graduate student Baoquan Ding have developed a DNA cassette — shown here as red L-shaped structures — containing a nanomechanical device that can be inserted within a DNA array and function there. (Image courtesy of New York University)

The results pave the way for creating nanoscale “assembly lines” in which more complex maneuvers could be executed.

The signals that control the nanomechanical tool are DNA rather than RNA. If this were scaled up, activation with DNA could work with MEMS and NEMS systems that feed different activation DNA from thousands or millions of parallel channels. The massively parallel dip pen arrays are currently at 55,000 and are targeted at 1,000,000 parallel dip pens Labs on a chip also have thousands of microchannels.

There are also light activated molecules.

The dimensions of the machine are approximately 110 x 30 x 2 nm.

How precise could the nanorobotic arms get ? The more precise the smaller the molecules they could manipulate.
How could they be best used to precisely catalyze desired molecular reactions?
How much could the DNA chemistry be extended?

DNA origami

DNA nanoactuator for interfacting DNA with electronics

DNA building blocks

Proposed Cubic micron DNA system

DNA used to assemble carbon nanotubes

DNA chemistry with polymers DNA nanotechnology chemistry can be extended with polymers and variant DNA and interation with other molecules.