0000000001295633
AUTHOR
Mauri A. Kostiainen
Biotemplated Lithography of Inorganic Nanostructures (BLIN) for Versatile Patterning of Functional Materials
Here, we present a highly parallel fabrication method dubbed biotemplated lithography of inorganic nanostructures (BLIN) that enables large-scale versatile substrate patterning of metallic and semi...
Prospective Cancer Therapies Using Stimuli‐Responsive DNA Nanostructures
Financial support by the Emil Aaltonen Foundation, the Sigrid Jusélius Foundation, the Magnus Ehrnrooth Foundation, Academy of Finland (grants no. 317042 and 331151), the Jane and Aatos Erkko Foundation and the Vilho, Yrjö and Kalle Väisälä Foundation of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters is gratefully acknowledged Nanostructures based on DNA self-assembly present an innovative way to address the increasing need for target-specific delivery of therapeutic molecules. Currently, most of the chemotherapeutics being used in clinical practice have undesired and exceedingly high off-target toxicity. This is a challenge in particular for small molecules, and hence, developing robust and ef…
Reconfigurable DNA Origami Nanocapsule for pH-Controlled Encapsulation and Display of Cargo
DNA nanotechnology provides a toolbox for creating custom and precise nanostructures with nanometer-level accuracy. These nano-objects are often static by nature and serve as versatile templates for assembling various molecular components in a user-defined way. In addition to the static structures, the intrinsic programmability of DNA nanostructures allows the design of dynamic devices that can perform predefined tasks when triggered with external stimuli, such as drug delivery vehicles whose cargo display or release can be triggered with a specified physical or chemical cue in the biological environment. Here, we present a DNA origami nanocapsule that can be loaded with cargo and reversibl…
Dynamic DNA Origami Devices
DNA nanotechnology provides an excellent foundation for diverse nanoscale structures that can be used in various bioapplications and materials research. Among all existing DNA assembly techniques, DNA origami proves to be the most robust one for creating custom nanoshapes. Since its invention in 2006, building from the bottom up using DNA advanced drastically, and therefore, more and more complex DNA-based systems became accessible. So far, the vast majority of the demonstrated DNA origami frameworks are static by nature; however, there also exist dynamic DNA origami devices that are increasingly coming into view. In this review, we discuss DNA origami nanostructures that exhibit controlled…
Unraveling the interaction between doxorubicin and DNA origami nanostructures for customizable chemotherapeutic drug release
Doxorubicin (DOX) is a commonly employed drug in cancer chemotherapy, and its high DNA-binding affinity can be harnessed in preparing programmable DOX-loaded DNA nanostructures that can be further tailored for targeted delivery and therapeutics. Although DOX has been widely studied, the existing literature of promising DOX-loaded DNA nanocarriers remains limited and incoherent. A number of reports have over-looked the fundamentals of the DOX-DNA interaction, let alone the peculiarities arising from the complexity of the system as a whole. Here, based on an in-depth spectroscopic analysis, we characterize and optimize the DOX loading into different 2D and 3D scaffolded DNA origami nanostruct…
Metallic Nanostructures Based on DNA Nanoshapes
Metallic nanostructures have inspired extensive research over several decades, particularly within the field of nanoelectronics and increasingly in plasmonics. Due to the limitations of conventional lithography methods, the development of bottom-up fabricated metallic nanostructures has become more and more in demand. The remarkable development of DNA-based nanostructures has provided many successful methods and realizations for these needs, such as chemical DNA metallization via seeding or ionization, as well as DNA-guided lithography and casting of metallic nanoparticles by DNA molds. These methods offer high resolution, versatility and throughput and could enable the fabrication of arbit…
Dynamic DNA Origami Devices: from Strand-Displacement Reactions to External-Stimuli Responsive Systems
DNA nanotechnology provides an excellent foundation for diverse nanoscale structures that can be used in various bioapplications and materials research. Among all existing DNA assembly techniques, DNA origami proves to be the most robust one for creating custom nanoshapes. Since its invention in 2006, building from the bottom up using DNA advanced drastically, and therefore, more and more complex DNA-based systems became accessible. So far, the vast majority of the demonstrated DNA origami frameworks are static by nature; however, there also exist dynamic DNA origami devices that are increasingly coming into view. In this review, we discuss DNA origami nanostructures that exhibit controlled…
One-step large-scale deposition of salt-free DNA origami nanostructures
AbstractDNA origami nanostructures have tremendous potential to serve as versatile platforms in self-assembly -based nanofabrication and in highly parallel nanoscale patterning. However, uniform deposition and reliable anchoring of DNA nanostructures often requires specific conditions, such as pre-treatment of the chosen substrate or a fine-tuned salt concentration for the deposition buffer. In addition, currently available deposition techniques are suitable merely for small scales. In this article, we exploit a spray-coating technique in order to resolve the aforementioned issues in the deposition of different 2D and 3D DNA origami nanostructures. We show that purified DNA origamis can be …
Custom-shaped metal nanostructures based on DNA origami silhouettes.
The DNA origami technique provides an intriguing possibility to develop customized nanostructures for various bionanotechnological purposes. One target is to create tailored bottom-up-based plasmonic devices and metamaterials based on DNA metallization or controlled attachment of nanoparticles to the DNA designs. In this article, we demonstrate an alternative approach: DNA origami nanoshapes can be utilized in creating accurate, uniform and entirely metallic (e.g. gold, silver and copper) nanostructures on silicon substrates. The technique is based on developing silhouettes of the origamis in the grown silicon dioxide layer, and subsequently using this layer as a mask for further patterning…
Plasmonic nanostructures through DNA-assisted lithography
DALI combines DNA origami with conventional top-down fabrication for creating designer high-resolution plasmonic nanostructures.
Aptamer-embedded DNA origami cage for detecting (glycated) hemoglobin with a surface plasmon resonance sensor
DNA origami-based cages functionalized with aptamer motifs, were used to detect hemoglobin and glycated hemoglobin. The binding between the cages and hemoglobin was monitored using a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor. One DNA strand in the nano-cage was replaced with an aptamer that demonstrated a high affinity to hemoglobin (Hb) or glycated hemoglobin (gHb). Three types of the DNA nano-cages designed to fit the size and shape of hemoglobin were evaluated: one without an aptamer, one with the Hb-affinity aptamer (HA) and one with the gHb-affinity aptamer (GHA). Both DNA nano-cages embedded with HA and GHA showed significantly more stable binding with Hb and gHb by 5 and 9 times, respec…
DNA-Based Enzyme Reactors and Systems
During recent years, the possibility to create custom biocompatible nanoshapes using DNA as a building material has rapidly emerged. Further, these rationally designed DNA structures could be exploited in positioning pivotal molecules, such as enzymes, with nanometer-level precision. This feature could be used in the fabrication of artificial biochemical machinery that is able to mimic the complex reactions found in living cells. Currently, DNA-enzyme hybrids can be used to control (multi-enzyme) cascade reactions and to regulate the enzyme functions and the reaction pathways. Moreover, sophisticated DNA structures can be utilized in encapsulating active enzymes and delivering the molecular…
High-Generation Amphiphilic Janus-Dendrimers as Stabilizing Agents for Drug Suspensions
Pharmaceutical nanosuspensions are formed when drug crystals are suspended in aqueous media in the presence of stabilizers. This technology offers a convenient way to enhance the dissolution of poorly water-soluble drug compounds. The stabilizers exert their action through electrostatic or steric interactions, however, the molecular requirements of stabilizing agents have not been studied extensively. Here, four structurally related amphiphilic Janus-dendrimers were synthesized and screened to determine the roles of different macromolecular domains on the stabilization of drug crystals. Physical interaction and nanomilling experiments have substantiated that Janus-dendrimers with fourth gen…
DNA Origami-Mediated Substrate Nanopatterning of Inorganic Structures for Sensing Applications
Structural DNA nanotechnology provides a viable route for building from the bottom-up using DNA as construction material. The most common DNA nanofabrication technique is called DNA origami, and it allows high-throughput synthesis of accurate and highly versatile structures with nanometer-level precision. Here, it is shown how the spatial information of DNA origami can be transferred to metallic nanostructures by combining the bottom-up DNA origami with the conventionally used top-down lithography approaches. This allows fabrication of billions of tiny nanostructures in one step onto selected substrates. The method is demonstrated using bowtie DNA origami to create metallic bowtie-shaped an…