Caltech Researchers Weigh Individual Molecules

karvind writes "PhysOrg reports that physicists at the California Institute of Technology have created the first nanodevices capable of weighing individual biological molecules. This technology may lead to new forms of molecular identification that are cheaper and faster than existing methods, as well as revolutionary new instruments for proteomics. The Caltech devices are 'nanoelectromechanical resonators' -- essentially tiny tuning forks about a micron in length and a hundred or so nanometers wide that have a very specific frequency at which they vibrate when excited. Slashdot covered earlier the effort by Cornell for measuring attogram objects which also employs NEMS cantilevers."

Comments

Finally!

[InternationalCow]

Now we can really measure how many angels can fit together on a pinhead! More seriously, this technology opens up interesting possibilities for high-througput easy mutation screening. Base substitutions (mutations) in a given stretch of DNA will obviously alter its weight. In this way you can easily (well, relatively speaking) detect the presence of a mutation, after which you can select the stretch of DNA that the mutation is in for sequence analysis. It'd be an interesting application for us geneticists.