Diffusion of single star-branched dendrimer-like DNA

We report a single-molecule fluorescence study on the diffusion of star-branched polymer dendrimer-like DNA (DL-DNA). The DL-DNA molecules were synthesized from ligating Y-shaped DNA to the fourth generation. It was found through single particle tracking that the diffusion coefficient of DL-DNA changes in a nonmonotonic fashion with its increased concentration possibly due to arm arrest and arm retraction. The diffusion of DL-DNA in linear lambda DNA solution displayed a monotonic concentration dependence I order of magnitude greater than the diffusion of DL-DNA in DL-DNA solution. This difference is attributed to the different conformation of DL-DNA and lambda DNA and the entanglement of lambda DNA with a large radius of gyration. Our diffusion study facilitates DL-DNA transportation for drug delivery.