Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 7, 2026

Construction and Operation of a Light-driven Gold Nanorod Rotary Motor System
Published on: June 30, 2018
Resolving rotational motions of nano-objects in engineered environments and live cells with gold nanorods and
Gufeng Wang1, Wei Sun, Yong Luo
1Ames Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy, and Department of Chemistry, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa 50011, United States.
Abstract:
Gold nanorods are excellent orientation probes due to their anisotropic optical properties. Their dynamic rotational motion in the 3D space can be disclosed with Nomarski-type differential interference contrast (DIC) microscopy. We demonstrate that by using the combination of gold nanorod probes and DIC microscopy, we are able to resolve rotational motions of nano-cargos transported by motor proteins at video rate not only on engineered surfaces but also on cytoskeleton tracks in live cells.

