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Direct measurement of electrical transport through DNA molecules

Nature volume 403, pages 635–638 (2000)Cite this article

Abstract

Attempts to infer DNA electron transfer from fluorescence quenching measurements1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 on DNA strands doped with donor and acceptor molecules have spurred intense debate10,11 over the question of whether or not this important biomolecule is able to conduct electrical charges. More recently, first electrical transport measurements on micrometre-long DNA ‘ropes’12, and also on large numbers of DNA molecules in films13, have indicated that DNA behaves as a good linear conductor. Here we present measurements of electrical transport through individual 10.4-nm-long, double-stranded poly(G)-poly(C) DNA molecules connected to two metal nanoelectrodes, that indicate, by contrast, large-bandgap semiconducting behaviour. We obtain nonlinear current–voltage curves that exhibit a voltage gap at low applied bias. This is observed in air as well as in vacuum down to cryogenic temperatures. The voltage dependence of the differential conductance exhibits a peak structure, which is suggestive of the charge carrier transport being mediated by the molecular energy bands of DNA.

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Figure 1: Current–voltage curves measured at room temperature on a DNA molecule trapped between two metal nanoelectrodes.
Figure 2: Current–voltage curves that show that transport is indeed measured on DNA trapped between the electrodes.
Figure 3: Differential conductance dI/dV versus applied voltage V at 100 K (a), and various models for the transport (b).
Figure 4: Temperature dependence of the voltage gap in the I–V curves for three different samples.

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Acknowledgements

We thank L. Gurevich for assistance in the fabrication and measurements; E. W. J. M. van der Drift, A. van der Enden, L. E. M. de Groot, S. G. Lemay, A. K. Langen-Suurling, R. N. Schouten, Z. Yao, T. Zijlstra, M. R. Zuiddam, M. P. de Haas, J. M. Warman, A. Storm, N. Kemeling and J. Jortner for assistance and discussions; and E. Kramer and E. Yildirim for the DNA characterization measurements. This work was supported by the Dutch Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter (FOM).

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  1. Alexey Bezryadin

    Present address: Physics Department, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 02138, USA

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  1. Department of Applied Sciences, Delft University of Technology, Delft, 2628 CJ, The Netherlands

    Danny Porath, Alexey Bezryadin, Simon de Vries & Cees Dekker

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Porath, D., Bezryadin, A., de Vries, S. et al. Direct measurement of electrical transport through DNA molecules. Nature 403, 635–638 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1038/35001029

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