"STORMBRAKER"
A Magnetic Tweezers based Force Spectrometer

January 15, 2025

During 2022 we worked on the implementation of a new force spectrometer for the lab. Based on a previous Magnetic Tweezers design, originally made by Julio Fernámdez (Colimbia Univ) and Rafael Tapia Rojo (King's College London), we modified it to generate a low-cost 3D printed force spectrometer. In this first iteration, me design and built an force spectrometer equipped with permanent magnets and manual control stage. The instrument is fully operative, and available to conducting single cell and molecule experiments. See below for more details.

3D PRINTED
MAGNETIC TWEEZERS

(updated on January 15, 2025)

Check the BSc thesis of our students related to microscope building

Magnetic tweezers (MT) are instruments preferred by several labs due to extraordinary ability to apply controlled mechanical forces. The use of permanent or electro-magnets turn the MT in a perfect passive force-clamp spectrometer enabling to apply from fractions of pN with a extraordinary bandwith.

Inspired by the work of Fernández and Tapia-Rojo at Columbia University (publication), we push forward the design to implement the first (partially) 3D printed Magnetic tweezers.

The opto-mechanical components resemble an inverted microscope, but heading the design is located the generator of magnetic field, an small electromagnet which theoretically wills allows us to apply up to 60-80 pN.

The microscope is fully operative, and the members of the lab besides conducting experiments on it also gave it a name, Stormbreaker, due to the ability of the microscope of apply forces through electrical currents.

We use the MT to characterize the elasticity of proteins in complement to our single molecule AFM. Check our publications using force spectrometers.

Tomas' thesis

Natalie's thesis

TH STL and Diagrams

ND STL and Diagrams