Nucleic Acid-Based Nanodevices in Biological Imaging.
The nanoscale engineering of nucleic acids has led to exciting molecular technologies for high-end biological imaging. The predictable base pairing, high programmability, and superior new chemical and biological methods used to access nucleic acids with diverse lengths and in high purity, coupled with computational tools for their design, have allowed the creation of a stunning diversity of nucleic acid-based nanodevices. Given their biological origin, such synthetic devices have a tremendous capacity to interface with the biological world, and this capacity lies at the heart of several nucleic acid-based technologies that are finding applications in biological systems. We discuss these diverse applications and emphasize the advantage, in terms of physicochemical properties, that the nucleic acid scaffold brings to these contexts. As our ability to engineer this versatile scaffold increases, its applications in structural, cellular, and organismal biology are clearly poised to massively expand.
Department of Chemistry, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637; email: kasturi@uchicago.edu , atv@uchicago.edu , yamuna@uchicago.edu.
Kasturi
K
Chakraborty
Department of Chemistry, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637; email: kasturi@uchicago.edu , atv@uchicago.edu , yamuna@uchicago.edu.
Aneesh T
AT
Veetil
Department of Pharmacology, Weill Medical College of Cornell University, New York, New York 10065; email: srj2003@med.cornell.edu.
Samie R
SR
Jaffrey
Department of Chemistry, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637; email: kasturi@uchicago.edu , atv@uchicago.edu , yamuna@uchicago.edu.|Grossman Institute for Neuroscience, Quantitative Biology and Human Behavior, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637.
Yamuna
Y
Krishnan
D052157:Aptamers, Nucleotide / Q000737:chemistry; D020029:Base Pairing; D015374:Biosensing Techniques; D004247:DNA / Q000737:chemistry / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D012321:DNA-Directed RNA Polymerases / Q000737:chemistry / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D004926:Escherichia coli / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D017404:In Situ Hybridization, Fluorescence; D018625:Microscopy, Atomic Force; D057054:Molecular Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D049329:Nanostructures / Q000737:chemistry; D036103:Nanotechnology / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*; D009690:Nucleic Acid Conformation; D012313:RNA / Q000737:chemistry / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D018724:Spinacia oleracea / Q000737:chemistry
D052157:Aptamers, Nucleotide; D012313:RNA; D004247:DNA; D012321:DNA-Directed RNA Polymerases
AFM; FISH; Spinach; aptamers; functional bioimaging; live imaging; nucleic acid nanodevices; structural DNA nanotechnology; super-resolution microscopy