DNA machines get a move on
Devices made from nucleic acids are starting to find their feet, says Nina Notman
The human body hosts millions of molecular motors and other machines. They keep our lungs breathing, our hearts beating, our brains thinking and our digestive systems gurgling. ‘Life is just amazing. The more we learn about all the incredible functionality that’s present on a microscopic level of life, the more many of us are filled with the desire to be able to recapitulate similar kinds of functionality synthetically,’ says William Shih, a biochemistry professor at Harvard University in Massachusetts, US.
An oft-cited inspiration for researchers in this field is the cult 1966 science fiction movie Fantastic Voyage, where a submarine and its crew were shrunk and sent into the body of an injured scientist to repair his brain. The hope is that, one day, man-made molecular machines will routinely enter our bodies to carry out tasks such as delivering drugs, completing diagnoses and conducting surgical procedures. Other non-medical uses for molecular machines include as analytical tools and as nanofactories for synthesising compounds.