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Micro-Motor - Overview

Generating mechanical power to drive microdevices has great implications in future energy utilization as well as medical science. Fortunately, nature has provided us with numerous brilliant examples of nano-scale molecular machines. Some functional nanodevices derived from living organisms, such as motor proteins, can efficiently convert chemical energy into mechanical work.

Using life-form power to propel micromotors has a number of unique advantages over conventional energy utilization process. This include efficient conversion of chemical energy into mechanical work and the potential of procedural control. The development of an appropriate interface between the bacteria and synthetic devices should enable us to realize useful hybrid micro-machines.

In this project, we described some micromotors powered by bacteria. The motor is one of the most important parts in the whole design of Bactomotor. It provides a attaching surface for E. coli and serves to concentrate propelling forces generated by the bacteria. In order to achieve this design, the well-studied biotin-strepatavidin interaction was applied to bind the bacteria to the motor.

The motor we need should have the following characteristics:

1. It should be symmetrical and small enough to match the size of bacteria, saying ~ 50μm.
2. Only one side of the motor has biotinteria so that the motor can only rotate in one direction,either clockwise or counterclockwise.

Besides, it needs to be rigid and can undergo chemical modifications through which biotin can be coated on its surface.

Taking into account the above considerations, we have designed two versions of motor using either Immobilon-P transfer membrane or the inorganic elemental silicon.