{"id":139278,"date":"2022-05-13T02:02:18","date_gmt":"2022-05-13T07:02:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2022\/05\/researchers-invent-worlds-smallest-biomechanical-linkage"},"modified":"2022-05-13T02:02:18","modified_gmt":"2022-05-13T07:02:18","slug":"researchers-invent-worlds-smallest-biomechanical-linkage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2022\/05\/researchers-invent-worlds-smallest-biomechanical-linkage","title":{"rendered":"Researchers invent world\u2019s smallest biomechanical linkage"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/researchers-invent-worlds-smallest-biomechanical-linkage3.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Researchers at Princeton University have built the world\u2019s smallest mechanically interlocked biological structure, a deceptively simple two-ring chain made from tiny strands of amino acids called peptides.<\/p>\n<p>In a <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/paper\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">paper<\/a> published August 23 in <i>Nature Chemistry<\/i>, the team detailed a library of such structures made in their lab\u2014two interlocked rings, a ring on a dumbbell, a daisy chain and an interlocked double lasso\u2014each around one billionth of a meter in size. The study also demonstrates that some of these structures can toggle between at least two shapes, laying the groundwork for a biomolecular switch.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve been able to build a bunch of structures that no one\u2019s been able to build before,\u201d said A. James Link, professor of chemical and <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/biological+engineering\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">biological engineering<\/a>, the study\u2019s principal investigator. \u201cThese are the smallest threaded or interlocking structures you can make out of peptides.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Researchers at Princeton University have built the world\u2019s smallest mechanically interlocked biological structure, a deceptively simple two-ring chain made from tiny strands of amino acids called peptides. In a paper published August 23 in Nature Chemistry, the team detailed a library of such structures made in their lab\u2014two interlocked rings, a ring on a dumbbell, [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":661,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,19,38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-139278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biological","category-chemistry","category-engineering"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/661"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139278\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}