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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 16: Poster Session I

BP 16.27: Poster

Tuesday, March 27, 2007, 17:00–19:30, Poster D

Brownian dynamics of rods in a crowded environment — •Tobias Munk, Felix Höfling, Erwin Frey, and Thomas Franosch — Arnold-Sommerfeld-Center und CeNS, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Theresienstraße 37, 80333 München

Molecular crowding in the cell provides a heterogeneous, randomly structured medium. The properties of this environment strongly influence the diffusion of proteins and stiff polymers.

We have developed a theoretical model that mimics the essentials of this motion: A single spherical or rod-like object moves through a fixed array of hard-core obstacles. By means of Brownian dynamics simulations, we investigate the dynamics of the overdamped motion over nine decades in time and compare to a purely ballistic motion. For rods, interesting phenomena occur due to anisotropic friction and the coupling of rotational and translational degrees of freedom. In particular, we analyze predictions of the tube model.