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Self-Assembling DNA Pyramids

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the new-and-improved-building-blocks dept.

FleaPlus writes "Physicists in England and the Netherlands have unveiled a technique for constructing rigid DNA pyramids. With the technique, trillions of d4's can rapidly self-assemble from a solution of single-stranded DNA. The scientists also showed that single DNA strands called linkers could be used to attach the tetrahedra to each other, acting as a possible building block for 3D nanofabrication."

2 of 108 comments (clear)

  1. Re:In lay-man's terms this means... by Hatta · · Score: 4, Interesting

    First of all, the DNA pyramids are useful because they have some attractive properties, namely they are about 10 nanometers wide and are rigid. They are also tetrahedral in shapre (3 faces and a base) which makes them good building blocks

    To be precise, a tetrahedron has 4 identical faces. It doesn't make sense to distinguish one as the "base". This is in contrast to an actual "pyramid" shape, like the ones in Egypt, which have a square base, and 4 triangular sides.

    This all lends itself rather nicely to developing things like three dimensional electronic circuits.

    Aren't all electronic circuits three dimensional, since we live in a 3d universe? If not, does going in 3 dimensions let us do anything more? My guess is that a 2d turing complete computer is the same as a 3d turing complete computer, so what's your point?

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  2. Triangles by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is awesome, I accidentally produced something that I suspect is very similar to this no more than 8 months ago using DNA to self-assemble gold nanoparticles. The pictures are gorgeous (but inconclusive, unfortunately). http://web.mit.edu/neltnerb/www/bn-triangles-1.jpg http://web.mit.edu/neltnerb/www/bn-triangles-2.jpg Sorry, I have no particular desire to register an account here for my very rare posts. And Kuna, don't laugh. I promise, I'm not a total dork. But DNA self assembly is still cool.