The magnetic tweezer is a single-molecule instrument that can apply a constant force to a biomolecule over a range of extensions, and is therefore an ideal tool to study biomolecules and their interactions. However, the video-based tracking inherent to most magnetic single-molecule instruments has traditionally limited the instrumental resolution to a few nanometers, above the length scale of single DNA base-pairs. Here we have introduced superluminescent diode illumination and high-speed camera detection to the magnetic tweezer, with graphics processing unit-accelerated particle tracking for high-speed analysis of video files. We have demonstrated the ability of the high-speed magnetic tweezer to resolve particle position to within 1 Å at 100 Hz, and to measure the extension of a 1566 bp DNA with 1 nm precision at 100 Hz in the presence of thermal noise.
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April 2013
Research Article|
April 29 2013
A high-speed magnetic tweezer beyond 10,000 frames per second
Bob M. Lansdorp;
Bob M. Lansdorp
1Materials Department,
University of California Santa Barbara
, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA
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Shawn J. Tabrizi;
Shawn J. Tabrizi
2College of Creative Studies,
University of California Santa Barbara
, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA
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Andrew Dittmore;
Andrew Dittmore
1Materials Department,
University of California Santa Barbara
, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA
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Omar A. Saleh
Omar A. Saleh
a)
3Materials Department and Biomolecular Science and Engineering Program,
University of California Santa Barbara
, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA
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a)
Electronic mail: saleh@engineering.ucsb.edu
Rev. Sci. Instrum. 84, 044301 (2013)
Article history
Received:
March 09 2013
Accepted:
April 08 2013
Citation
Bob M. Lansdorp, Shawn J. Tabrizi, Andrew Dittmore, Omar A. Saleh; A high-speed magnetic tweezer beyond 10,000 frames per second. Rev. Sci. Instrum. 1 April 2013; 84 (4): 044301. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4802678
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