Biomolecular-Motor-Based Nano- or Microscale Particle Translocations on DNA Microarrays

Abstract

We aimed to create autonomous on-chip systems that perform targeted translocations of nano- or microscale particles in parallel using machinery that mimics biological systems. By exploiting biomolecular-motor-based motility and DNA hybridization, we demonstrate that single-stranded DNA-labeled microtubules gliding on kinesin-coated surfaces acted as cargo translocators and that single-stranded DNA-labeled cargoes were loaded/unloaded onto/from gliding microtubules at micropatterned loading/unloading sites specified by DNA base sequences. Our results will help to create autonomous molecular sorters and sensors.

Information Rates of Active Propagation in Microchannel Molecular Communication

“…Our simulation environment is similar to the one in [8,10]. We use a rectangular propagation environment (with rounded corners), consisting of a strip loading zone and an unloading zone.…”

“…If active transport is employed, mictotubule filaments moving over molecular motor tracks that cover the whole environment, pick up and transport the information carrying vesicles from the loading zone to the unloading zone. The reader is referred to [10] for detailed explanation of this process.…”

“…Figure 1 shows a sample simulation run. For molecular motors, as in [10], we assume that the microchannel is lined with static kinesin motors, and that these motors cause microtubule filaments to propagate along their surface. The motion of the microtubule is largely regular, although the effects of Brownian motion cause random fluctuations.…”

“…The loading and unloading mechanics are assumed to be the same as those proposed in [10]. Initialization, loading, and unloading have certain differences between Brownian motion and the molecular motors.…”

Molecular communication: Harnessing biochemical materials to engineer biomimetic communication systems

“…In this arrangement, cargoes such as nano-or microspheres [7,14,41,40], virus particles [8], proteins [81,55,23], DNAs [16,91,80] and lipid vesicles [46] have been successfully transported. Considering that the gliding direction of MTs can be controlled by utilizing preconfigured microlithographic tracks [39,47] or by applying electric [95] and magnetic fields [48], the main challenge in this arrangement is to load/unload cargoes onto/from gliding MTs at a sender/receiver in a reversible manner.…”