(updated on April 19, 2021)

Magnetic tweezers (MT) are an 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.

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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.

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Although the microscope is not operative yet, members of the lab gave it a name, Stormbreaker, due to the ability of the microscope of apply forces through electrical currents. However, lately they called Optimus.

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