Coacervate droplets as a liquefier for the solid-to-liquid transition of RNA aggregates.

Engineered complex coacervates liquefy solid RNA–peptide aggregates into functional liquid droplets, with small-molecular anion–based coacervates showing optimal efficacy.

• Why it matters: RNA sequence-specific interactions can push biomolecular condensates into dysfunctional solid aggregates, and reversing that solidification to restore function is a key barrier for synthetic biology and therapeutics.
• What they did: The team combined systematic experiments with all-atom simulations to map a multiscale mechanism, linking micrometer-scale coacervate infiltration to nanometer-scale molecular buffering that fluidizes crosslinked networks.
• The result: Applying this design rule in a model of pathologically solidified ribonucleoprotein assemblies functionally rescues silenced RNA, enabling active compositional control of biomolecular phase behavior.

AI summary of the abstract · may contain errors · not medical advice · read the paper.