The talk will discuss the interaction between charged biological surfaces in contact with an electrolyte solution composed of multivalent rod-like ions. The system will be theoretically described by a functional density theory. The conditions for the attractive interaction between like-charged surfaces mediated by rod-like ions will be presented. The theoretical results will be compared with the Monte Carlo simulations. The preliminary experimental results with multivalent rod-like ions will be shown. Finally, I will consider the adsorption of DNA molecules to zwitterionic lipid layers and the transmembrane distribution of membrane components driven by electrostatics and the shape of membrane components.