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Updated: Jul 10, 2026

Self-Assembly of Gamma-Modified Peptide Nucleic Acids into Complex Nanostructures in Organic Solvent Mixtures
Published on: June 26, 2020
Effects of oligoDNA template length and sequence on binary self-assembly of a nucleotide bolaamphiphile
Rika Iwaura1, Yoshihiro Kikkawa, Mayumi Ohnishi-Kameyama
1National Food Research Institute, National Agriculture and Food Research Organization, 2-1-12 Kannondai, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8642, Japan. riwaura@affrc.go.jp
Abstract:
Templated self-assembly of nucleotide bolaamphiphile 1 (in which a 3'-phosphorylated thymidine moiety is connected to each end of a long oligomethylene chain) with a 10-, 20-, 30-, or 40-meric single-stranded oligoadenylic acid (2, 3, 4, or 5) led to the formation of right-handed helical nanofibers in 0.1x Tris/EDTA (TE) buffer solutions. The helical pitch increased as the length of the oligoadenylic acid template increased. DNA composed of oligoadenylic and oligocytidylic acid sequences (6, 7, and 8) also acted as templates to induce the formation of helical nanofiber structures. The diameter of the nanofibers remained constant (6-6.6 nm) irrespective of the template used. The binary self-assembly of 1 with 4 also produced higher-order, double-stranded nanofibers.
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