Conformational dynamics is crucial for ribonucleic acid (RNA) function. Techniques such as
nuclear magnetic resonance, cryo-electron microscopy, small-and wide-angle X-ray …

Optical tweezers are tools made of light that enable contactless pushing, trapping, and
manipulation of objects, ranging from atoms to space light sails. Since the pioneering work …

The advent of single-molecule force spectroscopy represents the introduction of forces,
torques, and displacements as controlled variables in biochemistry. These methods afford …

RNA's diversity of structures and functions impacts all life forms since primordia. We use
calorimetric force spectroscopy to investigate RNA folding landscapes in previously …

Both natural biomaterials and synthetic materials benefit from complex energy landscapes
that provide the foundation for structure–function relationships and environmental sensitivity …

Folding of ribozymes into well-defined tertiary structures usually requires divalent cations.
How Mg2+ ions direct the folding kinetics has been a long-standing unsolved problem …

Abstract Knowledge of the elastic properties, eg, the persistence length or interphosphate
distance, of single-stranded (ss) and double-stranded (ds) DNA under different experimental …

The experimental measurement of correlation functions and critical exponents in disordered
systems is key to testing renormalization group (RG) predictions. We mechanically unzip …

Abstract In Huntington's Disease (HD) and related disorders, expansion of CAG trinucleotide
repeats produces a toxic gain of function in affected neurons. Expanded huntingtin (exp …

Base stacking is crucial in nucleic acid stabilization, from DNA duplex hybridization to single-
stranded DNA (ssDNA) protein binding. While stacking energies are tiny in ssDNA, they are …