News
4/08/2026 Front cover on ACS nano
Simon investigated how the type of labels on our DNA carriers changes the translocation through solid-state nanopores. TWe show that he differences of the translocation between DNA with different labels are subtle. Depending on your application they might change the location of a binder along your DNA molecules. Check out the work in his
ACS nano paper. Check also the great front cover that Simon created. Congratulations for a great paper and cover!
4/05/2026 Single-molecule nanoarray for short RNA
Yunxuan designed a library of DNA molecules that can be count 10s of short RNA molecules with solid-state nanopore sensing. The single-molecule resolution of the technique miniaturizes microarray sensing to true nanoarray detection with minimal sample volumes. In her
paper, Yunxuan uses 27 different DNA molecules to detect up to 81 different RNA sequences. The project is part of a collaboration with
Jinbo at Dalian. The technology will also enable new sensing approaches developed by
Cambridge Nucleomics, the KeyserLab spin-out.
24/03/2026 Our guide for optimal nanopore sensing for nucleic acids.
Simon has written a practical guide to optimise signal-to-noise ratio, translocation time and throughput in solid-state nanopore experiments. We provide a systematic framework linking voltage, pore geometry and buffer conditions to experimental performance. We link the performance to physical principles underlying translocation and parameter-dependent behaviour, including electrophoresis, electro-osmotic flow, hydrodynamic friction and entropic effects. The concepts are transferable to broader nanoscale transport and sensing systems. Check out the review out now in
Physics of Life Reviews.
7/11/2025 Glass nanopore biosensing for quantification of RNA degradation.
Max and Mohammed used our glass nanopore sensors to characterize RNA degradation at the single molecule level. We show how to use simple assumptions about the ionic current signal in the nanopore with the size of the molecules for RNA fragment sizing. Very nice work led by Casey Platnich and published in
Analytical Chemistry.
7/11/2025 Raluca wins Best Poster Award at Sensors Day 2025.
Our PhD student Raluca is funded through the
EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Sensor Technologies. She presented her first year work on
Investigating Protein-RNA Interactions by Solid-State Nanopore Sensing and won the Best Research Poster Award. Congratulations for the great success early in the PhD!
16/10/2025 Urea changes translocation of RNA:DNA hybrids.
Our lab published research led by Thieme and Casey on the changes that urea makes on translocation Dynamics. In their paper, they show that RNA:DNA hybrids appear to stiffen if urea is added during the assembly of the molecules. They use nanopore sensing and atomic force microscopy and show that this is due to interactions with RNA:DNA not with DNA:DNA systems. The work was done in a collaboration with Jeremy Baumberg. You can read the full story in
Angewandte Chemie. The work was highlighted by Yang and Gao in
ChemBioChem.
