A U.S. research team led by a Korean researcher says it's created a three-dimensional metallic crystal by joining DNA strands to metal nano particles.

The team was led by Northwestern University chemistry Professor Chad Mirkin and the University of Rochester's Dr. Park Sung-yong.

The researchers attached a DNA strand to a gold particle with a diameter of ten nanometers, or one billionth of a meter, and created two substances with different crystal structures.

The study was published online as the lead article for the journal Nature on Thursday.

The team used DNA as sort of a blueprint and means of creation, opening the road to creating substances with certain functionalities in a self-assembly method.

Park, who is listed as the lead author in the study, received his physics doctorate at Seoul National University in 1999 and did research at Northwestern.