Medicine is not only logical, practical and scientific. With all the qualities mentioned it also enters a creative realm which allows it to efficiently progress and reach completely new territories of science. Medicine makes use of high tech devices, such as 3D printing programs, which allow experts to play with DNA structures in order to create special sequences that would automatically assemble themselves into various shapes. They managed to shape DNA structures into bunnies, bottles and stick figures.
“Controlling matter at the nanoscale is the fundamental problem of nanotechnology. If we can precisely control the arrangements of molecules at the nanoscale, there are many applications that can be envisioned”, one of the creative DNA experts stated.
A DNA bunny is not only a creative result of medical experts who spend their pastime building playful toys. If doctors enter the playground, they do it for a reason, namely to create special devices that can be used in biological research and possibly therapeutics. According to the experts, the groundbreaking aspect of the discovery lays in the newfound potential to automate the process and create shapes that were previously impossible to synthesize. The new algorithm allows doctors to create new DNA structures and ultimately run a special program to see what list of DNA sequences could be combined to deliver a particular shape.
The new technique enables scientists to develop the exact shape they want and right after that a special software takes control and figures out how to build it. Special algorithms look for a way to join base pairs of DNA and if they fail to succeed, they create new edges, in the same way complex 3D models are developed on a computer.
DNA origami is made possible through 3D printing technology and this is not only an alternative way to make use of spare time between surgeries, this could be used to deliver cancer drugs, while helping scientists understand how cells communicate in the body.
The new capacity to produce new DNA structures can be translated into new ways to use DNA in order to deliver medicine into patient’s bodies. This new method prevents the structures from disintegrating in the process. Newfound and revolutionary design possibilities offer a larger space between helices which makes things function much better in biological environments.
Image Source: slideshare.net
