Remote-controlled DNA

12 January 2002

GENES could be switched on and off remotely, using magnetic fields. Joseph
Jacobson and his team at MIT’s Media Lab in Cambridge, Massachusetts, tagged
strands of DNA with gold crystals just 1.4 nanometres across. When a solution of
the strands was put in a magnetic field oscillating at 49 gigahertz, the
currents induced in the gold particles produced enough heat to break the strands
apart. When the field was switched off, the broken strands rejoined (
Nature, vol 415, p 152). The technique should work to control genes,
enzymes or proteins, says Jacobson.