A DNA-Based Methodology for Preparing Nanocluster Circuits, Arrays, and Diagnostic Materials

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Abstract
The following article is an edited transcript of the presentation given by Chad A. Mirkin (Northwestern University), recipient of the 1999 Outstanding Young Investigator award, at the 1999 Materials Research Society Spring Meeting on April 6 in San Francisco. Some examples of new work have been added to the transcript.Our group has been developing a couple of projects over the past few years, both of which deal with the general area of nanotechnology. We are very excited about this work because we think it will lead to a general methodology for preparing nanostructured materials from common inorganic building blocks and readily available DNA-interconnect molecules. The intellectual payoff from this work will be a greater understanding of the collective interactions between nanoscale building blocks in the context of organized materials, while the technological payoffs range from the development of new and useful types of DNA detection strategies, to highperformance catalysts, to the realization of bioelectronic nanocircuitry.The field of nanotechnology faces three main challenges. The first is to develop a combination of tools and materials that allows us to make small structures and control the architecture of large structures on the nanometer-length scale. Of course, we must be able to do this routinely before we can really explore this field in detail. The second important challenge is to determine the chemical and physical consequences of miniaturization, which is where the real science comes into play in nanotechnology.