Unraveling DNA tori under tension
Biological Physics
2013-05-29 v1
Abstract
Motivated by recent experiments, we develop a model for DNA toroids under external tension. We find that tori are the equilibrium states for our model up to a critical tension, above which they become only metstable. Above this tension, we find a cascade of transitions between discrete toroid states that successively lowers the winding number, until the ground state (rod) is reached. In this process, this model predicts a nearly constant force plateau as a function of extension, in agreement with experiment.
Cite
@article{arxiv.0904.4069,
title = {Unraveling DNA tori under tension},
author = {C. Battle and B. van den Broek and M. C. Noom and J. van Mameren and G. J. L. Wuite and F. C. MacKintosh},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0904.4069},
year = {2013}
}
Comments
9 pages, 11 figures