Fig. 1

Schematic of the sliding system and working principle. a Two gold nanocrystals (AuNCs, 10 nm) crosslink two DNA origami filaments in antiparallel. Each filament comprises ten rows of footholds (coded 1–10) with 7 nm spacing. The foothold rows are reversely positioned along the two filaments, which possess opposite polarities as indicated using ‘ + ’ and ‘ – .’ The filaments are connected by the scaffold strand to ensure a correct conformation as well as to enable structural flexibility. A pair of fluorophores (donor: ATTO 550 and acceptor ATTO 647 N) are tethered at one end of the origami to allow for in situ optically monitoring the sliding dynamics via fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET). D and A represent donor and acceptor, respectively. b Upon addition of blocking strands 4 and 8, and removal strands \(\bar 2\) and \(\bar 6\), toehold-mediated strand displacement reactions take place. Rows 4 and 8 are blocked and the AuNCs are released from these rows. Meanwhile, rows 2 and 6 are activated to bind the AuNCs. As a result, the two AuNCs slide the filaments relative to one another for one step in a cooperative manner, introducing a 14 nm displacement