Research Interests
Utilizing optical tweezers, we can trap and conduct high precision nano-mechanical measurements on a single DNA-ligand molecule to determine its physical properties as well as the free energy landscape that governs the assembly mechanism.
Other research interests: carbon nanomaterials such as carbon nanotube (CNTs) and graphene
Publications:
Almaqwashi, A.A., Kevek, J. W., Burton, R. M., DeBorde, T., & Minot, E. D. (2011). Variable-force microscopy for advanced characterization of horizontally aligned carbon nanotubes. Nanotechnology, 22(27), 275717
Almaqwashi, A.A., Paramanathan, T., Lincoln, P., Rouzina, I., Westerlund, F., & Williams, M. C. (2014). Strong DNA deformation required for extremely slow DNA threading intercalation by a binuclear ruthenium complex. Nucleic acids research, 42, 11634-11641
Bahira, M., McCauley, M.J., Almaqwashi, A.A., Lincoln, P., Westerlund, F., Rouzina, I. and Williams, M.C. (2015) A ruthenium dimer complex with a flexible linker slowly threads between DNA bases in two distinct steps. Nucleic acids research, 43, 8856-8867
Almaqwashi, A. A., Andersson, J., Lincoln, P., Rouzina, I., Westerlund, F., & Williams, M. C. (2016). Dissecting the Dynamic Pathways of Stereoselective DNA Threading Intercalation. Biophysical Journal, 110, 1255-1263
Almaqwashi, A. A., Paramanathan, T., Rouzina, I., & Williams, M. C. (2016). Mechanisms of small molecule–DNA interactions probed by single-molecule force spectroscopy. Nucleic Acids Research, 44, 3971-3988
Almaqwashi, A. A., Andersson, J., Lincoln, P., Rouzina, I., Westerlund, F., & Williams, M. C. (2016). DNA intercalation optimized by two-step molecular lock mechanism. Scientific Reports, 6, 379
Almaqwashi, A.A., Zhou, W., Naufer, M.N., Riddell, I.A., Yilmaz, Ö.H., Lippard, S.J. and Williams, M.C. (2019). DNA Intercalation Facilitates Efficient DNA-Targeted Covalent Binding of Phenanthriplatin. JACS, 141 (4), 1537-1545
Fouda, A. N., El Shazly, M. D., & Almaqwashi, A. A. (2021). Facile and scalable green synthesis of N-doped graphene/CNTs nanocomposites via ball milling. Ain Shams Engineering Journal, 12 (1), 1017-1024
A N Fouda and Ali A Almaqwashi (2023). Synthesized partially unzipped carbon nanotubes and potential DNA/CNTs. Phys. Scr. 98 065955
Conferences:
American Physical Society NW meeting, 2011, Corvallis, Oregon, Acoustic cavitation of individual UCA microbubbles confined in capillaries
Biophysical Society 58th, 2014, San Francisco, California, Quantifying the molecular mechanism for highly stereo-selective DNA threading intercalation
Biophysical Society 59th, 2015, Baltimore, Maryland, Resolving the DNA binding mode of a rotationally flexible binuclear ruthenium complex
American Physical Society March Meeting, 2015, San Antonio, Taxes, Quantifying the molecular mechanism for highly stereo-selective DNA threading intercalation
American Physical Society March Meeting, 2017, New Orleans, Louisiana, Resolving DNA-ligand intercalation in the entropic stretching regime
International conference on Advances in Functional Materials, 2019, Los Angeles, California, Synthesis of nitrogen doped
graphene/carbon nanotubes nanocomposite using urea and humic acid