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Self-organized architectures from assorted DNA-framed nanoparticles

Nature Chemistry volume 8, pages 867–873 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

The science of self-assembly has undergone a radical shift from asking questions about why individual components self-organize into ordered structures, to manipulating the resultant order. However, the quest for far-reaching nanomanufacturing requires addressing an even more challenging question: how to form nanoparticle (NP) structures with designed architectures without explicitly prescribing particle positions. Here we report an assembly concept in which building instructions are embedded into NPs via DNA frames. The integration of NPs and DNA origami frames enables the fabrication of NPs with designed anisotropic and selective interactions. Using a pre-defined set of different DNA-framed NPs, we show it is possible to design diverse planar architectures, which include periodic structures and shaped meso-objects that spontaneously emerge on mixing of the different topological types of NP. Even objects of non-trivial shapes, such as a nanoscale model of Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, can be self-assembled successfully.

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Figure 1: Schematic diagram of nanoscale modules that incorporate NPs and DNA origami frames into pχNPs.
Figure 2: Nanoclusters and 1D arrays assembled from the pχNPs.
Figure 3: Assembly of 2D square NP arrays.
Figure 4: Designed architecture: nanoscale analogue of Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, assembled from multiple types of pχNPs.

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Acknowledgements

Research carried out at the Center for Functional Nanomaterials, Brookhaven National Laboratory, was supported by the US Department of Energy, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, under Contract No. DE-AC02-98CH10886.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Functional Nanomaterials, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, 11973, New York, USA

    Wenyan Liu, Jonathan Halverson, Ye Tian, Alexei V. Tkachenko & Oleg Gang

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  1. Wenyan Liu
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  2. Jonathan Halverson
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  3. Ye Tian
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  4. Alexei V. Tkachenko
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  5. Oleg Gang
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Contributions

W.L. and O.G. conceived and designed the experiments. W.L. performed the experiments. W.L., Y.T. and O.G. analysed the data. J.H. and A.V.T. contributed to the theoretical/numerical analysis. W.L. and O.G. wrote the paper. O.G. supervised the projects. All the authors discussed the results and commented on the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Oleg Gang.

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Liu, W., Halverson, J., Tian, Y. et al. Self-organized architectures from assorted DNA-framed nanoparticles. Nature Chem 8, 867–873 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nchem.2540

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