Nanotechnology gives A variety of chances to add to biology. In this article I'll existing illustrations where nanofabrication – the ability to make confined structures with dimensions at will – is utilized to examine the biophysics of single molecules and cells. I will present some examples from our lab:
Reconstitution of ultrawide DNA origami pores in liposomes for transmembrane transport of macromolecules
Dynamics of initiation, termination and reinitiation of DNA translocation from the motor protein EcoR124I
Sculpting nano-electrodes by using a transmission electron beam for electrical and geometrical characterization of nanoparticles.
2012, discovery that nucleoid occlusion underlies the precision of bacterial cell division; and 1st at any time analyze from the dynamics DNA supercoils and the discovery of supercoil hopping
From the decades pursuing these discoveries, my analysis passions shifted to biophysics and nanobiology, and I became a lot less associated with the event of nanotube electronics. The main target of numerous scientists in the sector also shifted to graphene (where by, funnily adequate, the main graphene ribbons have been described as ‘nanotubes which are cut open together their duration’) after the invention of the two-dimensional materials in 2004.
Length Charge of personal carbon nanotubes by nanostructuring Using the scanning tunneling microscope
Finding out DNA loop extrusion by SMC proteins for chromosome architecture with solitary-molecule assays.
‘You should not just consider the queries of tomorrow, but in addition consider the inquiries on the day just after tomorrow’
Dekker started out his study on solitary carbon nanotubes in 1993 when he set up a whole new line of research to review electrical transportation through solitary organic and natural molecules in between nanoelectrodes. In 1996 a breakthrough was recognized with carbon nanotubes. This was obtained within a collaboration While using the group of Nobel laureate Richard Smalley. STM and nanolithography strategies were being https://www.ceesdekker.net used to exhibit that these nanotubes are quantum wires at The one-molecule amount, with excellent Bodily Attributes.
[fourteen] In 2005 Dekker turned involved in Netherlands-vast conversations about Smart Structure, a movement that he has because Obviously distanced himself from. Dekker advocates that science and faith are certainly not in opposition but can be harmonized.
Nanoscientist Cees Dekker can be an amiable and flamboyant male who appears Substantially more youthful than the sixty two many years he basically is – trendy Eyeglasses, psychedelic shirt, engaging smile – although not a single to squander time. He will take his time, but no more than important.
2008, initial observation of protein-coated DNA translocation through nanopores; fixed the origin on the electrophoretic power on DNA in nanopores; discovered an important velocity enhance of microtubules in electric fields; discovered an anomalous electro-hydrodynamic orientation of microtubules; and solved the origin of noise in carbon nanotubes in liquid
Supercoiling-dependent DNA binding: quantitative modeling and purposes to bulk and single-molecule experiments