Conformational Manipulation of DNA in Nanochannels Using Hydrodynamics

TL;DR

This paper investigates how hydrodynamic forces can be used to manipulate DNA in nanochannels, demonstrating increased elongation and slower relaxation kinetics compared to traditional electrophoretic methods, with a proposed model explaining the flow-induced elongation.

Contribution

It introduces a novel hydrodynamic approach for DNA manipulation in nanochannels and provides a model explaining the elongation mechanism based on shear-driven lift forces.

Findings

DNA elongation increases up to 3-fold with hydrodynamics

Relaxation kinetics are slowed down 3-fold

Hydrodynamic actuation improves DNA manipulation

Abstract

The control over DNA elongation in nanofluidic devices holds great potential for large-scale genomic analysis. So far, the manipulation of DNA in nanochannels has been mostly carried out with electrophoresis and seldom with hydrodynamics, although the physics of soft matter in nanoscale flows has raised considerable interest over the past decade. In this report the migration of DNA is studied in nanochannels of lateral dimension spanning 100 to 500 nm using both actuation principles. We show that the relaxation kinetics are 3-fold slowed down and the extension increases up to 3-fold using hydrodynamics. We propose a model to account for the onset in elongation with the flow, which assumes that DNA response is determined by the shear-driven lift forces mediated by the proximity of the channels' walls. Overall, we suggest that hydrodynamic actuation allows for an improved manipulation of DNA in nanochannels.