A molecular computing model using 3D Dumbbell DNA origami

Abstract:
Recently, DNA assembly based nano-devices have been developed to accomplish certain functions such as molecular messages sensing, detecting and logic computing. It has been proved to be a novel hot topic on molecular biology. In this paper, we utilize DNA to construct a logical computing device using a dumbbell-shaped origami structure, where cocaine-detecting biosensor cooperating with fluorescence probe was also established. The important roles of dumbbell-shaped structure in the model are as follows: the core structure of the model and linking components to effectively improve the local concentration of the substrate. Notably, the increase of local concentration can greatly improve the efficiency of the reaction, thus shortening the reaction time of the logic gates and molecular sensors. Compared to the existing logic computing models which mainly use oligonucleotides to realize calculating functions, the superiority of our design is that the DNA nicking enzymes are also introduced to perform computing functions.