DNA controlled assembly of soft nanoparticles.

DNA-encoding of solid nanoparticles requires surface-chemistry, which is often tedious and not generally applicable. In the present study non-covalently attached DNA are used to assemble soft nanoparticles (liposomes) in solution. This process displays remarkably sharp thermal transitions from assembled to disassembled state for which reason this method allows easy and fast detection of polynucleotides (e.g. DNA or RNA), including single nucleotide polymorphisms as well as insertions and deletions.