Development of Nucleic Acid-mediated Nanomaterials and Their Applications

Nucleic acid is a powerful building block for functional nanomaterials with extensive physiological function and structural potential. It's an ideal template to mediate the growth of metal nanoparticles, precisely controlling their size, structure and morphology. In this review, we introduced the mechanism of interaction between nucleic acid and metal ions, and reviewed the methods for synthesizing nanomaterials using the nucleic acid templates. The unique properties of nucleic acid mediated nanoparticles enable their broad application in molecule diagnosis, cell imaging, catalytic degradation, drug delivery and therapy. It provides a new strategy to improve the design and construction of functional nanomaterials and explore their application.