Automated design of stiffness-tunable DNA origami hollowframes for self-assembling metamaterials

Area of Science:

• Nanotechnology
• Materials Science
• Biomolecular Engineering

Background:

• DNA origami enables precise construction of nanoscale architectures.
• Current automated design methods for DNA origami are limited in scope and tunability.
• Tuning nanostructure stiffness is crucial for developing advanced metamaterials.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a fully automated design paradigm for creating stiffness-tunable DNA origami nanostructures.
• To enable the rapid translation of design specifications into manufacturable nucleotide-level models.
• To expand the design space for DNA origami-based architected metamaterials.

Main Methods:

• A novel automated design paradigm was developed to convert geometric specifications into DNA origami models.
• The method directly generates nucleotide-level designs from prescribed vertices, edges, and cross-sections.
• Three distinct nanostructures were designed and experimentally realized using a unified protocol.

Main Results:

• The automated design paradigm successfully generated manufacturable DNA origami models.
• Three structurally diverse nanostructures were fabricated, demonstrating the robustness of the method.
• The paradigm facilitated the deterministic assembly of hollow-frame building blocks into micron-scale lattices, including auxetic structures.

Conclusions:

• A new design abstraction for stiffness-tunable DNA origami nanostructures has been established.
• This automated approach significantly enhances the ability to engineer architected metamaterials with specific functional responses.
• The methodology offers a pathway for rapid prototyping and customization of DNA-based metamaterials.