Forcing DNA and RNA through Artifical Nanopores

Biological molecules can be forced to pass through an aperture in a thin membrane of only several nanometres in diameter (a nanopore). Under the right experimental conditions, the molecules will induce a change in an ionic current flowing through the nanopore. Here, we exploit this principle to detect individual molecules of DNA and RNA and...

Controlling nanopore size, shape and stability

Solid-state nanopores are considered a promising tool for the study of biological polymers such as DNA and RNA, due largely to their flexibility in size, potential in device integration and robustness. Here, we show that the precise shape of small nanopores (?5 nm diameter in 20 nm SiN membranes) can be controlled by using transmission electron...

Novel Batch Titanium Nitride CVD Process for Advanced Metal Electrodes

This article describes a novel CVD process for TiN films developed in a 300 mm Vertical Furnace. We have solved Chlorine incorporation at low temperature inside the TiN layer while at the same time the batch process yields a 3 times higher throughput per dual reactor system compared to a single wafer system with 3 chambers.We show process...

Novel Batch Titanium Nitride CVD Process for Advanced Metal Electrodes

End-joining long nucleic acid polymers

Many experiments involving nucleic acids require the hybridization and ligation of multiple DNA or RNA molecules to form a compound molecule. When one of the constituents is single stranded, however, the efficiency of ligation can be very low and requires significant individually tailored optimization. Also, when the molecules involved are very...

An RNA toolbox for single-molecule force spectroscopy studies

Precise, controllable single-molecule force spectroscopy studies of RNA and RNA-dependent processes have recently shed new light on the dynamics and pathways of RNA folding and RNAenzyme interactions. A crucial component of this research is the design and assembly of an appropriate RNA construct. Such a construct is typically subject to several...