Molecular robotic agents that survey molecular landscapes for information retrieval

DNA-based artificial motors have allowed the recapitulation of biological functions and the creation of new features. Here, we present a molecular robotic system that surveys molecular environments and reports spatial information in an autonomous and repeated manner. A group of molecular agents, ter...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature communications 2024-04, Vol.15 (1), p.3293-3293, Article 3293
Main Authors: Woo, Sungwook, Saka, Sinem K., Xuan, Feng, Yin, Peng
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
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Biology
Deoxyribonucleic acid
Design
DNA
Enzymes
Humanities and Social Sciences
Information processing
Information retrieval
Molecular interactions
multidisciplinary
Robotics
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Spatial data
Surveys
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Summary:DNA-based artificial motors have allowed the recapitulation of biological functions and the creation of new features. Here, we present a molecular robotic system that surveys molecular environments and reports spatial information in an autonomous and repeated manner. A group of molecular agents, termed ‘crawlers’, roam around and copy information from DNA-labeled targets, generating records that reflect their trajectories. Based on a mechanism that allows random crawling, we show that our system is capable of counting the number of subunits in example molecular complexes. Our system can also detect multivalent proximities by generating concatenated records from multiple local interactions. We demonstrate this capability by distinguishing colocalization patterns of three proteins inside fixed cells under different conditions. These mechanisms for examining molecular landscapes may serve as a basis towards creating large-scale detailed molecular interaction maps inside the cell with nanoscale resolution. Various methods, using DNA, have been reported for the recording of biomolecular interactions, but most are either destructive in nature or are limited to reporting pairwise interactions. Here the authors develop DNA-based motors, termed ‘crawlers’, that roam around and record their trajectories to allow the examination of molecular environments.
ISSN:2041-1723
2041-1723
DOI:10.1038/s41467-024-46978-2