With the long-term goal of creating living cells from non-living components, scientists in the field of synthetic biology ...

With the long-term goal of creating living cells from non-living components, scientists in the field of synthetic biology work with RNA origami. This tool uses the multifunctionality of the natural ...

The researchers tested the RNA origami in a lipid vesicle, a simple cell model system widely used in biology. Using so-called RNA aptamers, the artificial cytoskeleton was bound to the cell membranes.

The paper, by D. Han at Harvard Medical School in Boston, MA, and colleagues was titled, "Single-stranded DNA and RNA origami." ...

Using the new RNA origami technique, they succeeded in producing nanotubes that fold into cytoskeleton-like structures. The cytoskeleton is an essential structural component in cells that gives ...