Regensburg 2007 – wissenschaftliches Programm

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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 6: Biopolymer Conformation and Dynamics

BP 6.6: Vortrag

Montag, 26. März 2007, 15:45–16:00, H44

How does a straight polymer relax? — •Benedikt Obermayer¹, Oskar Hallatschek², Erwin Frey¹, and Klaus Kroy³ — ¹ASC und CeNS, LMU München — ²Lyman Laboratory of Physics, Harvard University — ³ITP, Universität Leipzig

Although the relaxation dynamics of semiflexible polymers from an initially straight conformation has been discussed extensively in the literature, this seemingly simple problem involves nontrivial physics that is not yet completely understood. This is partly due to the ambiguous meaning of “initially straight”, for which various realizations are conceivable. The filament could be stretched (by optical tweezers, electric fields, elongational flows, ...), but it could also be quenched, i.e., prepared in an initial low-temperature environment. In all cases, the longitudinal contraction is driven by the same purely stochastic forces, yet the resulting deterministic growth laws for pertinent observables reflect for short times fundamental differences in the underlying relaxation processes. We present a comprehensive explanation how these differences emanate from the various realizations and how they give rise to universal long-time relaxation. Further, we compare our theoretical results to recent experiments and simulations, give suggestions on how to test our predictions, and comment on the choice of proper observables.