DNA is a programmable molecular building block for sequence-encoded materials that are governed by Nature’s base pairing rules. The rules that govern DNA nanotechnology can be significantly expanded beyond what Nature offers by harnessing metal-nucleic acid chemistry; however, the “sequence-structure-property” relationships of DNA in the presence of are often poorly understood. This talk focuses on a data-driven approach to this challenge. We have developed a high-throughput experimental screening platform together with machine learning models to guide the discovery of a new class of DNA-based materials with promise for bioimaging and photonics applications: atomically precise DNA-templated silver nanoclusters (AgN-DNAs) with bright fluorescence. AgN-DNAs have diverse sequence-selected photoluminescence properties, but the rules that govern how DNA sequence selects nanocluster structure and properties have remained elusive. By combining high-throughput experiments and supervised machine learning with analytical studies of single nanocluster species, we develop models to design DNA molecules that can select the structures and colors of AgN-DNAs, as well as their functional binding. This approach has enabled the design of new AgN-DNAs that emit light in the near-infrared tissue transparency window, a key area of need for biomedical imaging.
Stacy Copp is an Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of California, Irvine, with joint appointments in Chemistry, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, and Physics. Copp received a B.S. in Physics and Mathematics from the University of Arizona (2011) and a PhD in Physics from UC Santa Barbara (2016). She held a Hoffman Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellowship and L'Oreal USA for Women in Science Fellowship at Los Alamos National Laboratory, before joining UC Irvine in 2019. At UC Irvine, she leads the Molecular Nanomaterials Lab, whose mission is to harness DNA and synthetic block polymers as programmable building blocks for nanoscale materials. Copp has pioneered machine learning approaches to DNA nanomaterials design, including the discovery of DNA-templated silver nanoclusters with sequence-selected atomic sizes and fluorescence colors. Her research has been recognized by recent awards such as the AFOSR Young Investigator Award, DOE Early Career Research Program Award, DEVCOM ARL HBCU/MI Early Career Program Award, and NIH Director’s New Innovator Award. In her spare time, she enjoys running, hiking, and the extreme sport of parenting.