Colloquium: The quest for high-conductance DNA

Abstract

The DNA molecule, well known from biology for containing the genetic code of all living species, has recently caught the attention of chemists and physicists. A major reason for this interest is DNA's potential use in nanoelectronic devices, both as a template for assembling nanocircuits and as an element of such circuits. Without question, a truly conducting form of DNA would have a major impact on developments in nanotechnology. It has also been suggested that extended electronic states of DNA could play an important role in biology, e.g., through the processes of DNA damage sensing or repair or through long-range charge transfer. However, the electronic properties of DNA remain very controversial. Charge-transfer reactions and conductivity measurements show a large variety of possible electronic behavior, ranging from Anderson and band-gap insulators to effective molecular wires and induced superconductors. Indeed, understanding the conductance of a complicated polyelectrolytic aperiodic system is by itself a major scientific problem. In this Colloquium, the authors summarize the wide-ranging experimental and theoretical results and look for any consistencies between them. They also pose simple questions regarding the electronic states of DNA within the framework of generalized H\"uckel and Slater-Koster theories. The Colloquium provides a quantitative overview of DNA's electronic states as obtained from density-functional theory, focusing on dependence on structure, on molecular stretching and twisting, and on water and counterions. While there is no clear theoretical basis for truly metallic DNA, situations are discussed in which very small energy gaps might arise in the overall DNA/water/counterion complex, leading to thermally activated conduction at room temperature.