title: Advances in magnetic tweezers for single molecule and cell biophysics.
abstract: Magnetic tweezers (MTW) enable highly accurate forces to be transduced to molecules to study mechanotransduction at the molecular or cellular level. We review recent MTW studies in single molecule and cell biophysics that demonstrate the flexibility of this technique. We also discuss technical advances in the method on several fronts, i.e., from novel approaches for the measurement of torque to multiplexed biophysical assays. Finally, we describe multi-component nanorods with enhanced optical and magnetic properties and discuss their potential as future MTW probes.
authors.affiliation: UCD Nanomedicine Centre, School of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland. gil.lee@ucd.ie.
authors.forename: Devrim
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Kilinc
authors.forename: Gil U
authors.initials: GU
authors.lastname: Lee
mesh_terms: D001703:Biophysics / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*; D008280:Magnetics / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*; D036103:Nanotechnology / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*