Assembling nanostructures from DNA using a composite nanotweezers with a shape memory effect

TL;DR

This paper presents a novel technique for fabricating and manipulating DNA nanostructures using composite nanotweezers with shape memory effect, enabling precise electrical measurements within an electron microscope.

Contribution

It introduces a new method for assembling and manipulating DNA nanostructures with shape memory nanotweezers, improving stability and reliability of electrical contact during measurements.

Findings

Successful fabrication of DNA structures with suspended threads.

Effective manipulation and stretching of DNA using shape memory nanotweezers.

Reliable electrical contact achieved for in-situ measurements.

Abstract

The article demonstrates a technique for fabricating a structure with the inclusion of suspended DNA threads and manipulating them using composite nanotweezers with shape memory effect. This technique could be suitable for stretching of nanothin DNA-like conductive threads and for measuring their electrical conductivity, including the I-V characteristic directly in the electron microscope chamber, where the nanotweezers provide a two-sided clamping of the DNA tip, giving a stable nanocontact to the DNA bundle. Such contact, as a part of 1D nanostructure, is more reliable during manipulations with nanothreads than traditional measurements when a nanothread is touched by a thin needle, for example, in a scanning tunnel microscope.