Cargo pick-up from engineered loading stations by kinesin driven molecular shuttles

Abstract

Exploiting biological motors ex vivo to transport and distribute cargo with high spatial control, as done by cells, requires that we learn how molecular shuttles (microtubules propelled by kinesin) can pick up cargo from defined surface regions (loading stations). The main challenge of building microfabricated cargo loading stations is to adjust the sum of non-covalent interactions such that the station stably holds on to the cargo under static conditions, but allows for transfer when a gliding microtubule collides with station-bound cargo and starts to pull on it. Successful pick-up of cargo could be observed using biotin–anti-biotin interactions and hybridized oligonucleotides. The effect of different tethering chemistries on the efficiency of cargo pick-up was tested.