Mitochondrial DNA Scale Model

Educational Artwork

oneohm

Following Follow project

Liked Like project

Become a Hackaday.io member

Just one more thing

To make the experience fit your profile, pick a username and tell us what interests you.

OK, I'm done! Skip

Similar projects worth following

247 views

0 comments

5 followers

3 likes

Description
Details
Files 0
Components 7
- View all
Logs 4
- View all
Instructions 0
Discussion 0

The 2016 Hackaday Prize

View Gallery

Description

For less than $200 you can have your full mitochondrial DNA sequenced. Cool!
Staring at the resulting text file on a computer monitor is a bit lackluster however...

How about a physical scale model?

16,570 hand strung 1 mm glass beads joined in a loop - The beaded pattern corresponding exactly to the base pair sequence.

Painstakingly checked and rechecked for accuracy. This strand exactly replicates my personal mitochondrial DNA sequence. Different colors represent the base pairs.
White - Guanine ~ 2169 beads
Purple - Adenine ~ 5124 beads
Green - Cytosine ~ 5181 beads
Orange - Thymine ~ 4094 beads
A relaxed mtDNA strand has a length of about 5.61 Micrometers (~16,500bp*340 pm).
The finished beaded sequence is close to 60 feet.

=> 3 million times larger than the actual mtDNA loop.

Components

3 × TOHO Round Seed Bead 15/0 Purple Lined Aqua (8g packs) http://beads.artbeads.com/jewelry-supplies/Tbrd15--252
2 × TOHO Round Seed Bead 15/0 Opaque White (8g packs) http://www.artbeads.com/tbrd15-41.html
3 × TOHO Round Seed Bead 15/0 Transparent Medium Green (10g packs) http://www.auracrystals.com/products/toho-round-seed-bead-15-0-transparent-medium-green-10g-15-7b
2 × TOHO Round Seed Bead 15/0 Transparent Medium Orange (10g packs) http://www.auracrystals.com/products/toho-round-seed-bead-15-0-transparent-medium-orange-10g-15-10b
1 × BeadSmith Flex-Rite Beading Wire, 49 Strand .018" Thick, 100 Foot Spool, Clear https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00TYWM3LO/

View all 7 components

Project Logs

Collapse

Wrapping up
oneohm • 10/03/2016 at 04:41 • 0 comments

The completed sequence - before joining the ends. Mitochondrial DNA is actually a ring-structure.
The Pattern
oneohm • 10/03/2016 at 04:36 • 0 comments

The colors correspond to the binding energy of the base pairs - I made a macro to color the cells and mark them off as I progressed - Always double checking each segment.
The Materials Assembled
oneohm • 10/03/2016 at 04:31 • 0 comments
The raw data for my mtDNA sequence
oneohm • 10/03/2016 at 04:24 • 0 comments

Fascinating intellectually, but a bit dull for the senses.