Pinpoint Delivery of Molecules by Using Electron Beam Addressing Virtual Cathode Display

Pause of the target gliding microtuble on the virtual cathode

We report the transient response of gliding microtubules on a virtual cathode. In vivo activities, microtubule-kinesin systems are known to act as motor proteins with respect to cell motility cytokinesis and cellular transport by hydrolyzing ATP molecules. With development of in vitro assays, motor proteins have been attracting much attention as a key component for highly efficient nano-transportation systems. The molecular functions based on structural states are affected by changing the ionic condition of the molecular functions and by changing the electrical field in solution because of electrical charges of the molecules. The virtual cathode, which was generated on the SiN display surface by a low energy electron beam, locally induced electrochemical reactions and electric field around the targeted molecules on the display surface, and then the gliding motions of the targeted microtubules were regulated. In this study, we demonstrated that the virtual cathode display temporally stops a selected gliding microtubule by only applying the virtual cathode to the microtubule. The pause mode of the microtubule was easily canceled by simply turning the virtual cathode off, and then the gliding motion was restarted.