Allemand co-pioneered single-molecule magnetic-tweezer manipulation of DNA and RNA, using calibrated magnetic forces/torques to measure the torsional and stretching mechanics of nucleic acids and the real-time kinetics of the motor proteins (helicases, polymerases, topoisomerases) that act on them. His joint lab with Vincent Croquette continues to develop new magnetic-tweezer instrumentation (including high-throughput and torque-sensing variants) applied to DNA replication, repair, and RNA processing machinery.

Bustamante is a founding figure of single-molecule biophysics, using optical and magnetic tweezers to measure the forces and torques generated by molecular motors (RNA polymerase, viral packaging motors, the ribosome) as they act on individual nucleoprotein complexes. The lab continues to push single-molecule force spectroscopy toward sub-piconewton, millisecond resolution to resolve mechanochemical intermediates invisible to bulk assays.

Uses optical and magnetic tweezers to study single-molecule mechanics and dynamics of molecular motors and nucleic-acid-processing enzymes with piconewton force resolution.

Croquette is a co-inventor of magnetic-tweezer single-molecule biophysics, applying it to helicase/topoisomerase mechanochemistry, DNA replication, and nucleic-acid mechanics; his group also develops complementary single-molecule readouts (stereo darkfield interferometry, mass photometry-adjacent tracking) for sub-nanometer 3D localization. He continues active, well-cited methodological development (e.g., recent reviews of magnetic-tweezer principles) alongside Jean-Francois Allemand.

Gruszka's Chromatin Dynamics Lab combines real-time single-molecule imaging with biochemistry and biophysics (including in Xenopus egg-extract systems) to study how epigenetic information carried by nucleosomes is disassembled and re-established during DNA replication. The lab is actively recruiting postdoctoral fellows.

Marko's lab applies statistical mechanics and single-molecule micromanipulation -- principally magnetic tweezers -- to chromosome structure and DNA-protein interactions, studying how condensin, topoisomerases, and other nucleoid-associated proteins organize and mechanically stabilize chromatin and mitotic chromosomes in vivo and in vitro. The group combines force spectroscopy with fluorescence microscopy to resolve single-DNA and single-chromosome mechanics at the piconewton scale.

Willem Vanderlinden uses high-resolution biophysical tools to study protein-nucleic acid interactions. Research: (1) magnetic tweezers for pN-scale force and torque measurements on single DNA molecules and nucleoprotein complexes during retroviral integration, DNA supercoiling, and chromatin remodelling; (2) high-speed AFM imaging of nucleoprotein complexes and chromosomal organisation; (3) quantitative single-molecule statistical analysis of DNA topology. His approach provides cutting-edge spatial resolution to study chromatin biophysics and mobile DNA elements at the single-molecule level.