[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
EMF and gene expression
Interesting in the spirit of cell phones
Remote-control for bacteria
Radio waves switch proteins on and off.
6 December 2002
PHILIP BALL
E.coli could be made to glow on demand
¿ Q.Sun/Uni of Texas.
Remote-controlled bacteria could be just around the
corner. Researchers have found a way to switch cell
processes on and off with radio waves.
The goal is "microbial machines", Joseph Jacobson of
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge
told this week's Materials Research Society meeting in
Boston.
Cells, he explained, could be equipped with a toolbox
of 'software' - such as the ability to glow
periodically1. Remote-controlled enzymes could cut and
paste these modules as if downloading a particular
program into the cells. This is a long way off, but
the components are taking shape.
Jacobson's team uses an electromagnetic field to
switch on and off an enzyme that snips open the
genetic messenger molecule RNA. First they attach a
tiny particle of gold to the enzyme.
Only millionths of a millimetre across, the gold
nanoparticle acts as an antenna, harvesting energy
from a radio-frequency electromagnetic field. This
energy breaks up the enzyme, rendering it useless.
When the field is switched off, the parts of the
enzyme re-assemble of their own accord.
Earlier this year the same team manipulated DNA in a
similar way2 . They stuck a gold antenna to DNA
strands that spontaneously curl up into hairpin
structures where the two ends zip together. A
radio-frequency pulse picked up by the gold antenna
opened up the hairpin.
Showing that the approach works for proteins too
greatly increases the range of things that might be
done with it - proteins orchestrate nearly all the
chemical processes in a cell.
References
Elowitz, M. B. & Leibler, S. A synthetic oscillatory
network of transcriptional regulators. Nature, 403,
335 - 338, (2000). |Article|
Hamad-Schifferli, K., Schwartz, J. J., Santos, A.T.,
Zhang, S. & Jacobson, J. M. Remote electronic control
of DNA hybridization through inductive coupling to an
attached metal nanocrystal antenna. Nature, 415, 152 -
155, (2002). |Article|
__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com
************************************************************************
You are currently subscribed to the Radsafe mailing list. To unsubscribe,
send an e-mail to Majordomo@list.vanderbilt.edu Put the text "unsubscribe
radsafe" (no quote marks) in the body of the e-mail, with no subject line.
You can view the Radsafe archives at http://www.vanderbilt.edu/radsafe/