Related papers: Helix untwisting and bubble formation in circular …
DNA hairpin molecules with periodic base sequences can be expected to exhibit a regular coarse-grained free energy landscape (FEL) as function of the number of open base pairs and applied mechanical force. Using a commonly employed model,…
We investigate, for the first time, the thermal signature of a single-stranded helical molecule that is described beyond usual nearest-neighbor electron hopping, by analyzing electronic specific heat. Depending on the hopping of electrons,…
The formation of local denaturation zones (bubbles) in double-stranded DNA is an important example for conformational changes of biological macromolecules. We study the dynamics of bubble formation in terms of a Fokker-Planck equation for…
Elastic scattering of a twisted (Bessel) electron beam by CO$_2$ molecules is studied theoretically at high energies. The molecule's structure is optimized using coupled cluster theory and density functional theory with…
A versatile approach to modeling the conformations and energetics of DNA loops is presented. The model is based on the classical theory of elasticity, modified to describe the intrinsic twist and curvature of DNA, the DNA bending…
Single-molecule experiments provide new insights into biological processes hitherto not accessible by measurements performed on bulk systems. We report on a study of the kinetics of a triple-branch DNA molecule with four conformational…
The elastic properties of semiflexible polymers are of great importance in biology. There are experiments on biopolymers like double stranded DNA, which twist and stretch single molecules to probe their elastic properties. It is known that…
An inhomogeneous helicoidal nearest-neighbor model with continuous degrees of freedom is shown to predict the same DNA melting properties as traditional long-range Ising models, for free DNA molecules in solution, as well as superhelically…
The binding of proteins onto DNA contributes to the shaping and packaging of genome as well as to the expression of specific genetic messages. With a view to understanding the interplay between the presence of proteins and the deformation…
We show how single-molecule unzipping experiments can provide strong evidence that the zero-force melting transition of long molecules of natural dsDNA should be classified as a phase transition of the higher-order type (continuous). We…
Standard DNA melting curves record the separation of the two strands versus temperature, but they do not provide any information on the location of the opening. We introduce an experimental method which adds a new dimension to the melting…
We present a study of the bend angle distribution of semiflexible polymers of short and intermediate lengths within the wormlike chain model. This enables us to calculate the elastic response of a stiff molecule to a bending moment. Our…
Understanding the melting of short DNA sequences probes DNA at the scale of the genetic code and raises questions which are very different from those posed by very long sequences, which have been extensively studied. We investigate this…
The symmetries of the DNA double helix require a new term in its linear response to stress: the coupling between twist and stretch. Recent experiments with torsionally-constrained single molecules give the first direct measurement of this…
Advances in DNA nanotechnology have stimulated the search for simple motifs that can be used to control the properties of DNA nanostructures. One such motif, which has been used extensively in structures such as polyhedral cages,…
Molecular dynamics simulations are used to study structure formation in simple model polymer chains that are subject to excluded volume and torsional interactions. The changing conformations exhibited by chains of different lengths under…
We study the elastic behaviour of a supercoiled DNA molecule. The simplest model is that of a rod like chain, involving two elastic constants, the bending and the twist rigidities. We show that this model is singular and needs a small…
We consider an elastic rod model for twisted DNA in the plectonemic regime. The molecule is treated as an impenetrable tube with an effective, adjustable radius. The model is solved analytically and we derive formulas for the contact…
The ground state of twist-bend nematic liquid crystals is a heliconical molecular arrangement in which the nematic director precesses uniformly about an axis, making a fixed angle with it. Both precession senses are allowed in the ground…
The helix is a ubiquitous motif for biopolymers. We propose a heuristic, entropically based model that predicts helix formation in a system of hard spheres and semiflexible tubes. We find that the entropy of the spheres is maximized when…