By Ed Yong | November 29, 2012 1:17 pm
For tens of thousands of years, humans have created sculptures by carving pieces from a solid block. They have chipped away at stone, metal, wood and ceramics, creating art by subtracting material. Now, a group of scientists from Harvard University have figured out how to do the same thing with DNA.
First, Yonggang Ke builds a solid block of DNA from individual Lego-like bricks. Each one is a single strand of the famous double helix that folds into a U-shape, designed to interlock with four neighbours. You can see what happens in the diagram below, which visualises the strands as two-hole Lego bricks. Together, hundreds of them can anneal into a solid block. And because each brick has a unique sequences, it only sticks to certain neighbours, and occupies a set position in the block.
This means that Ke can create different shapes by leaving out specific bricks from the full set, like a sculptor removing bits of stone from a block. Starting with a thousand-brick block, he carved out 102 different shapes, with complex features like cavities, tunnels, and embossed symbols. Each one is just 25 nanometres wide in any direction, roughly the size of the smallest viruses.
Kes work, led by Harvards Peng Yin, is the latest achievement from the growing field of DNA origami. Its forefather was the chemist Ned Seeman, who created a DNA cube in 1991 by annealing separate strands together. He followed this with a simple tubes and lattices, but his technique was laborious and inefficient.
Paul Rothemund greatly improved it in 2006. He showed that you can fold a long 7,000-letter strand of viral DNA into a specific shape by using hundreds of shorter snippets. These match different part of the viruss genome and staple it into place. Mix the strands togetherthe long scaffold and short staplesand they spontaneously fold into the right shape. Rothemund and others used the origami technique to create miniature maps, smiley faces, the word NED (in honour of Seeman), and more elaborate shapes like boxes.
Last year, Yins team broke off from the scaffold-and-staples tradition. I wrote about their work for Nature News:
Bryan Wei and his colleagues make shapes out of single strands of DNA just 42 letters long. Each strand is unique, and folds to form a rectangular tile. When mixed, neighbouring tiles stick to each other in a brick-wall pattern, and shorter boundary tiles lock the edges in place.
In their simplest configuration, the tiles produce a solid 64-by-103-nanometre rectangle, but Wei and his team can create more complex shapes by leaving out specific tiles. Using this strategy, they created 107 two-dimensional shapes, including letters, numbers, Chinese characters, geometric shapes and symbols. They also produced tubes and rectangles of different sizes, including one consisting of more than 1,000 tiles.
The team designed a robot to pick the tiles. The desired shape is drawn using a graphical interface, and the robot picks out and mixes the required strands. It can produce 48 shapes in as many hours. Millions of shapes can be crafted from the same set of tiles simply by leaving some out. Once you have a pre-synthesized library, you dont need any new DNA designs, says Yin. You just pick your molecules.
Excerpt from:
DNA Lego bricks produce nano-sculptures
- Molecular Visualizations of DNA - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- DNA Structure - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- Time Is Money Presents: Dna vs. T-rex - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- DNA Replication Process - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- darwin deez - dna (official video) - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- The Secret of Life -- Discovery of DNA Structure - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- DNA - Blonde Red Head (from Downtown 81) - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- How Big is Your Genome? Strange DNA - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- DNA live - August 27th, 2011 [August 27th, 2011]
- Amanda Knox's father says DNA evidence 'critical' - September 11th, 2011 [September 11th, 2011]
- Judge: No more DNA testing in Amanda Knox appeal - September 11th, 2011 [September 11th, 2011]
- NASA | DNA Building Blocks Can Be Made in Space - September 11th, 2011 [September 11th, 2011]
- Starchild Skull- The SHOCKING DNA Results Are In....WATCH THIS! *HD* - September 11th, 2011 [September 11th, 2011]
- Svante Pääbo: DNA clues to our inner neanderthal - September 11th, 2011 [September 11th, 2011]
- CIA may have tried 'to trick DNA from Bin Laden' - September 11th, 2011 [September 11th, 2011]
- SMACK/ URL Presents DNA vs X-Factor - September 11th, 2011 [September 11th, 2011]
- Court denies re-test of DNA in Amanda Knox trial - September 11th, 2011 [September 11th, 2011]
- Chapter 10: Tenacious DNA - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- dna - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- Saul Williams - DNA - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- DNA--Not Moving - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- DNA Extraction Home Experiment - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- How to extract DNA from strawberries - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- frequency 528 Hz (DNA repair frequency ?) : NO MUSIC single tone - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- darwin deez - dna [director's cut] - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- DNA Replication Song - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- BioRap (DNA Replication and Protein Synthesis with a Beat) - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- DNA Transcription and Protein Assembly - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- 888 Gateway DNA Meditation - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- From DNA to Protein - September 23rd, 2011 [September 23rd, 2011]
- Blame it on the DNA - September 24th, 2011 [September 24th, 2011]
- DNA Replication - September 24th, 2011 [September 24th, 2011]
- Recombinant DNA ©2004 Demonstratives, Inc. - September 24th, 2011 [September 24th, 2011]
- A Flock of Seagulls - DNA - September 24th, 2011 [September 24th, 2011]
- DNA - Detached (from Downtown 81) - September 24th, 2011 [September 24th, 2011]
- Aliens, UFOs, DNA - September 25th, 2011 [September 25th, 2011]
- DNA Speaks On Recent Battles And X-Factor - September 25th, 2011 [September 25th, 2011]
- The DNA of the World's Most Innovative Companies - September 25th, 2011 [September 25th, 2011]
- Anunnaki Human DNA 1 - September 25th, 2011 [September 25th, 2011]
- Host DNA Dicing - Green Phat Bet - 11bill+ Total - - September 25th, 2011 [September 25th, 2011]
- Judge Alex - DNA Test - September 25th, 2011 [September 25th, 2011]
- Prosecution downplays DNA in Knox appeal - September 26th, 2011 [September 26th, 2011]
- NASA officially announces alien DNA found in meteorites. - September 26th, 2011 [September 26th, 2011]
- Antimatter Found, Artificial DNA ,Social Unrest - September 26th, 2011 [September 26th, 2011]
- Chrono Khalid - DNA activation 2.0 - September 26th, 2011 [September 26th, 2011]
- 'Baby' Alien found by farmer in Mexico - DNA tests and scans baffles scientists - September 26th, 2011 [September 26th, 2011]
- DNA : The Secret Of Life (PBS) - September 26th, 2011 [September 26th, 2011]
- DNA - Size - September 27th, 2011 [September 27th, 2011]
- Starchild Skull 2010 DNA Result - September 28th, 2011 [September 28th, 2011]
- Cowboy BeBop- Ask DNA - September 28th, 2011 [September 28th, 2011]
- Symphony of Science -- DNA and Life - September 30th, 2011 [September 30th, 2011]
- Molecular Biology Visualization of DNA - October 2nd, 2011 [October 2nd, 2011]
- Same Dna Livin Life Ep 8 - October 4th, 2011 [October 4th, 2011]
- Danny Brown - DNA - October 4th, 2011 [October 4th, 2011]
- Rockmond Dunbar Traces His DNA To Nigeria - October 5th, 2011 [October 5th, 2011]
- TEDxFortGreeneSalon - Melvin Gibbs - The DNA Project - October 5th, 2011 [October 5th, 2011]
- Building a tiny "DNA brain" (Part I: design) - October 5th, 2011 [October 5th, 2011]
- DNA "Post-Summer Madness 2011" Interview Part 1 [EME] - October 5th, 2011 [October 5th, 2011]
- Proof that Evolution is True/Real/Fact: Mutations, DNA, Natural Selection - October 9th, 2011 [October 9th, 2011]
- DA John Bradley once excluded DNA testing - October 9th, 2011 [October 9th, 2011]
- Benbassat Says Apple's `DNA' Will Continue After Jobs - October 10th, 2011 [October 10th, 2011]
- BRO BOBBY HEMMITT; DNA TRANSFORMATION part 1 - October 10th, 2011 [October 10th, 2011]
- DNA - 2 Ounces And A Dream (Instrumental) - October 10th, 2011 [October 10th, 2011]
- The Truth About Italian DNA - October 10th, 2011 [October 10th, 2011]
- DNA - Ludovico Einaudi - October 13th, 2011 [October 13th, 2011]
- DNA - FAIR FIGHT (THE SNITCH) PROD BY : BLESSED BY THE BEATS - Video - October 13th, 2011 [October 13th, 2011]
- DNA REPAIR - Video - October 13th, 2011 [October 13th, 2011]
- DNA MUTATION - Video - October 14th, 2011 [October 14th, 2011]
- Spiritual DNA - Video - October 14th, 2011 [October 14th, 2011]
- DNA Structure - Video - October 14th, 2011 [October 14th, 2011]
- DNA - Video - October 14th, 2011 [October 14th, 2011]
- DNA Replication - Video - October 14th, 2011 [October 14th, 2011]
- THE DNA SONG - Video - October 14th, 2011 [October 14th, 2011]
- That Spells DNA by Jonathan Coulton - Video - October 15th, 2011 [October 15th, 2011]
- DNA Activation Power - 2012 Ascension - Video - October 15th, 2011 [October 15th, 2011]
- Journey Inside The Cell - Video - October 15th, 2011 [October 15th, 2011]
- DNA - ROMAN NUMERALS (MUSIC VIDEO) - Video - October 15th, 2011 [October 15th, 2011]
- DNA - Blonde Red Head - Video - October 16th, 2011 [October 16th, 2011]
- [HD] The Kills - DNA (Live in Paris @ Bataclan, April 6th, 2011) - Video - October 17th, 2011 [October 17th, 2011]
- Blackfield - DNA - Video - October 22nd, 2011 [October 22nd, 2011]