Two-color DNA nanoprobe of intracellular dynamics.

Milstein, Joshua N; Chu, Mike; Raghunathan, Krishnan; Meiners, Jens-Christian · Nano Lett · 2012

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

We have developed a correlation microscopy technique to follow the dynamics of quantum dot labeled DNA within living cells. The temporal correlation functions of the labels reflect the fluctuations of the DNA nanoprobe as a result of its interactions with the cellular environment. They provide a sensitive measure for the length of the probe on the scale of a persistence length (∼50 nm) and reveal strong nonthermal dynamics of the cell. These results pave the way for dynamic observations of DNA conformational changes in vivo.

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