Materials Research Society Meeting, Boston, December, 2002
Remote-control for bacteria
Radio waves switch proteins on and off.
6 December 2002
PHILIP BALL
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E.coli could be made to glow on
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© Q.Sun/Uni of Texas. |
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Remote-controlled bacteria could be just around the corner. Researchers
have found a way to switch cell processes on and off with radio waves.
The goal is "microbial machines", Joseph Jacobson of the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology in Cambridge told this week's Materials Research
Society meeting in Boston.
Cells, he explained, could be equipped with a toolbox of 'software' -
such as the ability to glow periodically1.
Remote-controlled enzymes could cut and paste these modules as if downloading a
particular program into the cells. This is a long way off, but the components
are taking shape.
Jacobson's team uses an electromagnetic field to switch on and off an
enzyme that snips open the genetic messenger molecule RNA. First they attach a
tiny particle of gold to the enzyme.
Only millionths of a millimetre across, the gold nanoparticle acts as an
antenna, harvesting energy from a radio-frequency electromagnetic field. This
energy breaks up the enzyme, rendering it useless. When the field is switched
off, the parts of the enzyme re-assemble of their own accord.
Earlier this year the same team manipulated DNA in a similar way2 . They stuck a gold antenna to DNA strands that spontaneously
curl up into hairpin structures where the two ends zip together. A
radio-frequency pulse picked up by the gold antenna opened up the hairpin.
Showing that the approach works for proteins too greatly increases the
range of things that might be done with it - proteins orchestrate nearly all
the chemical processes in a cell.
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