The reaction of phosphorothioates in DNA with 2-bromoethylammonium bromide results in S-2-aminoethyl phosphorothioates, which can rearrange to N-(2-mercaptoethyl)phosphoramidates providing a facile method for the generation of site-specific thiol labeling of DNA sequences. The applicability of this method was demonstrated by conjugation of the thiolated DNA sequence with Na-(3-maleimidylpropion...

Glutathione monolayer-protected gold clusters were reacted by place exchange with 19- or 20-residue thiolated oligonucleotides. The resulting DNA/nanoparticle conjugates could be separated on the basis of the number of bound oligonucleotides by gel electrophoresis and assembled with one another by DNA-DNA hybridization. This approach overcomes previous limitations of DNA/nanoparticle synthesis ...

In a typical protocol for attaching DNA to a gold electrode, thiolated DNA is incubated with the electrode at neutral pH overnight. Here we report fast adsorption of non-thiolated DNA oligomers on gold electrodes at acidic pH (i.e., pH ~3.0). The peak-to-peak potential difference and the redox peak currents in typical cyclic voltammetry of [Fe(CN)6](3-) are investigated to monitor the attachmen...

The kinetic adsorption profile at the DNA-gold nanoparticle (AuNP) interface is probed by following the binding and organization of thiolated linear DNA and aptamers of varying chain lengths (15, 30, 44, and 51 mer) to the surface of AuNPs (13.0 ± 1.0 nm diameter). A systematic investigation utilizing dynamic light scattering has been performed to directly measure the changes in particle size d...

Hydrosilylation of alkenes with epoxide-terminated tri(ethylene oxide) moieties on Si-H surfaces yields homogeneous monolayers for the efficient coupling of biomolecules. The wetting properties of the epoxide-functionalized surface allow for the spotting of solutions of biomolecules, making the surface amenable to microarraying. Immobilization of thiolated DNA was achieved in a single step to f...

A facile boiling water synthesis protocol has been developed to synthesize thiolated Ag nanoclusters with a core-shell Ag(0)@Ag(i)-thiolate structure, which was formed through condensation of Ag(i)-thiolate complexes on the surface of an in situ formed Ag(0) core. The as-synthesized thiolated Ag nanoclusters feature strong luminescence via aggregation-induced-emission (AIE).

The sensing mechanism of DNA with carbon nanotube– field effect transistor sensors is investigated by firstprinciples electronic structure calculations. We have investigated the interaction of individual DNA nucleobases (especially guanine and cytosine) with single walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs), and compared the binding energies of various configurations including π-stacking and direct bondin...

An efficient route for the synthesis of the phosphoramidite derivative of 5-methylcytosine bearing a tert-butylsulfanyl group protected thiol is described. This building block is used for the preparation of oligonucleotides carrying a thiol group at the nucleobase at the internal position of a DNA sequence. The resulting thiolated oligonucleotides are useful intermediates to generate oligonucle...

We report a method for obtaining highly reproducible surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) of single and double-stranded thiolated DNA oligomers. Following a protocol that relaxes the DNA into an extended conformation, SERS spectra of DNA oligonucleotides are found to be extremely similar, strongly dominated by the Stokes modes of adenine. A spectral correlation function analysis useful fo...