Parts | Days | Selection | Search | Downloads | Help
AKB: Biologische Physik
AKB 10: Biopolymers
AKB 10.5: Talk
Friday, March 4, 2005, 11:15–11:30, TU H2013
Relaxation of highly stretched DNA — •Oskar Hallatschek1, Erwin Frey1,2, and Klaus Kroy1 — 1Abteilung Theorie, Hahn-Meitner Institut, Glienicker Str. 100, 14109 Berlin, Germany — 2Fachbereich Physik, Freie Universität,14195 Berlin, Germany
We have investigated theoretically the effect of local properties such as bending stiffness and inextensibility on the large scale dynamics of semiflexible polymers. In this talk we will focus on the contraction dynamics of highly stretched DNA after a sudden tension release. The polymer passes through various dynamical regimes during the relaxation from a completely stretched to a coiled conformation. Before entering the universal Rouse relaxation described by the "stem–flower" model, the relaxation dynamics exhibits features unique to a worm–like chain. In particular, we predict a novel relaxation mode which is fast compared to the diffusive contraction predicted by the stem–flower model. On a logarithmic time scale this regime actually supersedes the latter, and consequently our predictions should be accessible to experiments if pushed to larger force and higher time resolution.