"One of the most important goals in the field of inorganic chemistry is to control metal arrays spatially and dynamically," Mitsuhiko Shionoya of the University of Tokyo told nanotechweb.org. "DNA shows promise as the provider of a structural basis for the bottom-up fabrication of inorganic and bio-organic molecular devices."
To achieve the result, Shionoya and colleagues replaced natural DNA bases with artificial copper-ion-containing bases based on hydroxypyridone. The copper ions aligned with a spacing of 0.37 nm, forming magnetic chains.
"We designed the metal-mediated base pairs so that they would be almost similar to natural base pairs in size and geometry," added Shionoya. "In addition, we used anionic nucleobases to reduce the electrostatic repulsion that would occur when cationic metal ions are lined up."
Now the researchers would like to make heterometallic arrays by incorporating artificial nucleobases that coordinate to ions of different metals. "And we would also like to use this system for three- or four-way junctions of DNA where metal ions are arrayed two-dimensionally," said Shionoya.
The researchers reported their work in Science.