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A mechanical metamaterial made from a DNA hydrogel

Nature Nanotechnology volume 7, pages 816–820 (2012)Cite this article

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Abstract

Metamaterials are artificial substances that are structurally engineered to have properties not typically found in nature. To date, almost all metamaterials have been made from inorganic materials such as silicon and copper1,2, which have unusual electromagnetic or acoustic properties1,2,3,4,5 that allow them to be used, for example, as invisible cloaks6,7,8,9, superlenses10,11,12 or super absorbers for sound13. Here, we show that metamaterials with unusual mechanical properties can be prepared using DNA as a building block. We used a polymerase enzyme to elongate DNA chains and weave them non-covalently into a hydrogel. The resulting material, which we term a meta-hydrogel, has liquid-like properties when taken out of water and solid-like properties when in water. Moreover, upon the addition of water, and after complete deformation, the hydrogel can be made to return to its original shape. The meta-hydrogel has a hierarchical internal structure and, as an example of its potential applications, we use it to create an electric circuit that uses water as a switch.

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Figure 1: Schematic diagram of the stepwise approach for DNA hydrogel synthesis.
Figure 2: Characterization of the R4M16 DNA hydrogel.
Figure 3: Liquid- and solid-like properties of the R4M16 hydrogel.
Figure 4: Morphology of the DNA hydrogel.
Figure 5: Electric circuit switch formed using the liquid- and solid-like properties of DNA meta-hydrogel.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank L. Archer and R. Mallavajula for helping with the mechanical test and C. Hui for insightful discussions. The authors also thank J. March, J. Hunter and T. Walter for proofreading this manuscript and Z. Li for discussions and suggestions. L.C. acknowledges support from the CAS/SAFEA International Partnership Program for Creative Research Teams. The present work was partially supported by grants from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of Defense (DOD).

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Author notes

  1. Jong Bum Lee and Songming Peng: These authors contributed equally to this work

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biological and Environmental Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, 14853, New York, USA

    Jong Bum Lee, Songming Peng, Dayong Yang, Young Hoon Roh, Hisakage Funabashi, Nokyoung Park, Edward J. Rice, Rong Long, Mingming Wu & Dan Luo

  2. Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Seoul, Seoul, 130-743, South Korea

    Jong Bum Lee

  3. Institute for Sustainable Sciences and Development, Hiroshima University, Higashi-Hiroshima City, 739-8511, Japan

    Hisakage Funabashi

  4. Frontier Research Lab., Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology, 449-712, South Korea

    Nokyoung Park

  5. Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou, 215123, China

    Liwei Chen

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  1. Jong Bum Lee
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Contributions

J.B.L., S.P. and D.L. designed the experiments. J.B.L., S.P., Y.H.R., H.F., N.P. and E.R. carried out the experiments. J.B.L., S.P., Y.H.R., H.F., D.Y., L.C., R.L., M.W. and D.L. contributed to the data analysis. J.B.L., S.P., Y.H.R., D.Y., R.L. and D.L. wrote the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Dan Luo.

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Lee, J., Peng, S., Yang, D. et al. A mechanical metamaterial made from a DNA hydrogel. Nature Nanotech 7, 816–820 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2012.211

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