Energy transport in crystalline DNA composites

Abstract

This work reports on the synthesis of crystalline DNA-composited films and microfibers, and details the study of thermal energy transport in them. The transient electro-thermal technique is used to characterize the thermal transport in DNA composite microfibers, and the photothermal technique is used to explore the thermal transport in the thickness direction of DNA films. Compared with microfibers, the DNA films are found to have a higher thermal transport capacity, largely due to the carefully controlled crystallization process in film synthesis. In high NaCl concentration solutions, the bond of the Na+ ion and phosphate group aligns the DNA molecules with the NaCl crystal structure during crystallization. This results in significant enhancement of thermal transport in the DNA films with aligned structure.