Flexible magnetic filaments as micromechanical sensors
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Updated: Aug 29, 2026

High-Speed Magnetic Tweezers for Nanomechanical Measurements on Force-Sensitive Elements
Published on: May 12, 2023
C Goubault1, P Jop, M Fermigier
1Laboratoire Colloïdes et Matériaux Divisés, UMR 7612, ESPCI, 10 rue Vauquelin, 75005 Paris, France.
Abstract:
We propose a new micromechanical approach to probe bending rigidity at molecular scale. Long flexible filaments made of magnetic colloids and linkers are shown to adopt under magnetic field a hairpin configuration. Measuring the hairpin curvature as a function of the field intensity and the linker length from diffracted light allows us to deduce the linker bending rigidity kappa. The technique is presented for two types of linkers: a spontaneously adsorbing polymer and a grafted biomolecular.
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