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A Traffic Control System For Molecules

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the turn-right-at-the-corpuscle dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "Our cells contain small protein factories which have to deliver materials inside the cell via a network of microtubules. And the transportation is carried out by biomolecular motors. Now, researchers from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands have built a traffic control system able to force individual molecules to choose between 'roads' by applying strong electrical fields locally at Y-junctions. This traffic control system can potentially lead to new nano-fabrication techniques. Read more for additional references and pictures showing how this traffic system works."

6 of 64 comments (clear)

  1. Right! This won't go wrong by Quirk · · Score: 4, Funny

    As anyone who has to make a long commute to and from work knows, we've got traffic control down and running smoothly. Nothing could go wrong here.

    --
    "Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
    Cohen
  2. The Next Step by Umbral+Blot · · Score: 3, Funny

    All that's missing are tiny traffic cops who hand out tiner speed tickets.

    --

    Philosophy.
  3. Minature Train Set! by sc0p3 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Hottest toy for next Christmas! Train sets so small you can't see them!
    Seriously though, as a biomedical engineer, this is bloody scary.

    This was the first time that this orientation-dependency of the electrophoretic mobility was observed.

    - This occurs in the body, we have microtubles and kinesin in all our cells. The 'research' has shown for *years* that magnetic fields have *no* effect on cancer etc.. so.. it controls Kinesin, but wont affect cells? please.

  4. What took so long? by sbhobdell · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is all a bit old hat, isn't it?
    I was pushing bloodcells around using dielectrophoresis in Uni over a decade ago. Shortly thereafter, water was being tested for purity using the same method, and one of the post-docs was moving tagged proteins around too.
    How come it took so long to create a system to be used in protein manufacture?
    examples:
    http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/abs_free.jsp?arNumb er=297897 (1994)
    http://www.biophysj.org/cgi/content/abstract/77/1/ 516 (1994)
    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd= Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=9351287&dopt=Citation (1997)

    1. Re:What took so long? by pimpimpim · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Well (disclaimer: I did not really read any of the articles), dielectrophoresis seems a 'static' separation technique, to influence position of particles, and this stuff from Cees Dekker seems a sort of dynamic procedure to influence flow of particles, which is a whole step more complex. I would take 10 years to go from one to the other ;)

      On a different note, I am a bit dissappointed that it is the same Cees Dekker who is a (or better: the only) big promotor in the Netherlands of the idea of Intelligent Design. This guy is doing such amazing research, that you start to wonder how he could ever combine this with the not very well-founded theory that ID is.

      Note to people with mod points: I am stating my personal opinion here: if you disagree, don't mod me down because of this opinion, but give decent replies. If you think the post is crappy for what it is, then mod as you wish.

      --
      molmod.com - computing tips from a molecular modeling
  5. Maxwell's Demon now a possibility? by retrosteve · · Score: 3, Funny

    I always wondered when nanotech would get good enough to find out why (or if) Maxwell's Demon was really impossible.

    Now soon we'll know.