Blueprints for dodecahedral DNA cages

TY - JOUR

T1 - Blueprints for dodecahedral DNA cages

AU - Jonoska, N.

AU - Twarock, R.

PY - 2008/8/1

Y1 - 2008/8/1

N2 - Cage structures engineered from nucleic acids are of interest in nanotechnology, for example as a means of drug delivery (Destito et al 2007). Until now, most experimentally realized DNA cages have crystallographic symmetry, such as the shape of a cube (Chen and Seeman 1991 Nature 350 631-3), a tetrahedron (Goodman et al 2005 Science 310 1661-5), an octahedron (Shih et al 2004 Nature 427 618-21) or a truncated octahedron (Zhang and Seeman 1994 J. Am. Chem. Soc. 116 1661-9). Two examples of cages with non-crystallographic symmetry, a dodecahedron and a buckyball, have been realized recently (He et al 2008 Nature 452 198-201). A characteristic feature of these realizations is the fact that the cages are built from a number of identical building blocks called tiles: 20 for the case of the dodecahedron, and 60 for the case of the buckyball. We derive here a blueprint for the organization of nucleic acid in a dodecahedral cage such that the final product has a minimal number of strands. In particular, we show that a dodecahedral cage can be realized in terms of only two circular DNA molecules. We focus on the dodecahedral cage, because the volume to surface ratio of such a cage is larger than that of its crystallographic counterparts given the same fixed radial distance of the polyhedral vertices from the centre of the structure, whilst still requiring a smaller complexity than the truncated icosahedron (buckyball). We therefore expect that the dodecahedral DNA cages discussed here may be of interest in further applications in nanotechnology.

AB - Cage structures engineered from nucleic acids are of interest in nanotechnology, for example as a means of drug delivery (Destito et al 2007). Until now, most experimentally realized DNA cages have crystallographic symmetry, such as the shape of a cube (Chen and Seeman 1991 Nature 350 631-3), a tetrahedron (Goodman et al 2005 Science 310 1661-5), an octahedron (Shih et al 2004 Nature 427 618-21) or a truncated octahedron (Zhang and Seeman 1994 J. Am. Chem. Soc. 116 1661-9). Two examples of cages with non-crystallographic symmetry, a dodecahedron and a buckyball, have been realized recently (He et al 2008 Nature 452 198-201). A characteristic feature of these realizations is the fact that the cages are built from a number of identical building blocks called tiles: 20 for the case of the dodecahedron, and 60 for the case of the buckyball. We derive here a blueprint for the organization of nucleic acid in a dodecahedral cage such that the final product has a minimal number of strands. In particular, we show that a dodecahedral cage can be realized in terms of only two circular DNA molecules. We focus on the dodecahedral cage, because the volume to surface ratio of such a cage is larger than that of its crystallographic counterparts given the same fixed radial distance of the polyhedral vertices from the centre of the structure, whilst still requiring a smaller complexity than the truncated icosahedron (buckyball). We therefore expect that the dodecahedral DNA cages discussed here may be of interest in further applications in nanotechnology.

KW - BRANCHED JUNCTIONS

KW - BUILDING-BLOCKS

KW - NANODEVICES

KW - OCTAHEDRON

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=52349096888&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1088/1751-8113/41/30/304043

DO - 10.1088/1751-8113/41/30/304043

M3 - Article

SN - 1751-8113

VL - 41

JO - Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical

JF - Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical

IS - 30

M1 - 304043

ER -