And those light signals can be used to study the movement and change of proteins in real time.

Part of the innovation with this particular antenna is the way in which the receiver part of it is also used to sense the molecular surface of the protein it's studying.

"Experimental study of protein transient states remains a major challenge because high-structural-resolution techniques, including nuclear magnetic resonance and X-ray crystallography, often cannot be directly applied to study short-lived protein states," the team explains in their paper.

One advantage that this super-small DNA antenna has over other analysis techniques is that it's able to capture very short-lived protein states.

While exploring "the universality" of their design, the team successfully tested their antenna with three different model proteins – streptavidin, alkaline phosphatase and Protein G – but there's potentially much more to come, and one of the advantages of the new antenna is its versatility.