Controlling Assembly of Hybrid DNA Nanostructures into Higher-Order Structures via Hydrophobicity.

ABSTRACT: Hydrophobic interactions are one of the fundamental driving forces of self-assembly in living systems. It remains challenging to harness hydrophobicity to have a controllable and programmable assembly of DNA nanostructures. On the other hand, there is also a need to explore orthogonal hierarchical assembly strategies to be used as an additional toolset along with the traditional Watson-Crick base pairing to achieve complex superstructures. In this work, we rationally design and synthesize a series of low molecular weight hydrophobic molecules that are conjugated to single-stranded DNA strands. By incorporating these modified DNA strands into the precisely defined locations of DNA tiles and origami nanostructures, we achieve controlled hierarchical assembly driven by hydrophobic interaction

SUBMITTER: Saji M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12363646 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature