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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2017 Oct 28.
Published in final edited form as: Angew Chem Int Ed Engl. 2014 Jul 11;53(36):9471–9475. doi: 10.1002/anie.201403777

Figure 2.

Figure 2

(Top) As a test bed for our design efforts we use molecular beacons, a commonly employed sensor for the detection of specific nucleic acids.29–32 (Middle) To introduce cooperativity we added a second binding site contained partially within the 5′ strand of the stem and partially within an appended single-stranded tail. Binding to either site disrupts the stem, pushing the conformational equilibrium towards the higher affinity state. (Bottom) The binding of an unmodified molecular beacon is not cooperative, producing a Hill coefficient (nH) and dynamic range within error of the 1 and 81-fold values expected. The tailed beacon, in contrast, achieves a Hill coefficient of 1.54±0.10, shrinking the dynamic range to 17(±3)-fold. Error estimates here and elsewhere reflect estimated 95% confidence intervals.