Issue 6, 2023

Interplay of the mechanical and structural properties of DNA nanostructures determines their electrostatic interactions with lipid membranes

Abstract

Nucleic acids and lipids function in close proximity in biological processes, as well as in nanoengineered constructs for therapeutic applications. As both molecules carry a rich charge profile, and frequently coexist in complex ionic solutions, the electrostatics surely play a pivotal role in interactions between them. Here we discuss how each component of a DNA/ion/lipid system determines its electrostatic attachment. We examine membrane binding of a library of DNA molecules varying from nanoengineered DNA origami through plasmids to short DNA domains, demonstrating the interplay between the molecular structure of the nucleic acid and the phase of lipid bilayers. Furthermore, the magnitude of DNA/lipid interactions is tuned by varying the concentration of magnesium ions in the physiologically relevant range. Notably, we observe that the structural and mechanical properties of DNA are critical in determining its attachment to lipid bilayers and demonstrate that binding is correlated positively with the size, and negatively with the flexibility of the nucleic acid. The findings are utilized in a proof-of-concept comparison of membrane interactions of two DNA origami designs – potential nanotherapeutic platforms – showing how the results can have a direct impact on the choice of DNA geometry for biotechnological applications.

Graphical abstract: Interplay of the mechanical and structural properties of DNA nanostructures determines their electrostatic interactions with lipid membranes

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
28 sep 2022
Accepted
16 jan 2023
First published
16 jan 2023
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY-NC license

Nanoscale, 2023,15, 2849-2859

Interplay of the mechanical and structural properties of DNA nanostructures determines their electrostatic interactions with lipid membranes

D. Morzy, C. Tekin, V. Caroprese, R. Rubio-Sánchez, L. Di Michele and M. M. C. Bastings, Nanoscale, 2023, 15, 2849 DOI: 10.1039/D2NR05368C

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications, without requesting further permission from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given and it is not used for commercial purposes.

To request permission to reproduce material from this article in a commercial publication, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party commercial publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements