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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 7: Poster I

BP 7.52: Poster

Monday, March 23, 2009, 17:45–20:00, P3

Transfer matrix modelling of DNA charge transport with a diagonal-ladder model — •Stephen Wells¹, Chi-Tin Shih^2,3, and Rudolf Roemer¹ — ¹Department of Physics and Centre for Scientific Computing, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, UK — ²Department of Physics, Tunghai University, 40704 Taichung, Taiwan — ³Physics Division, National Center for Theoretical Sciences, Hsinchu, Taiwan

The structure of DNA, with its stacking of aromatic bases along the axis of the double helix, immediately suggests the possibility of significant charge transport along the molecule. There is increasing evidence that DNA can support a considerable degree of charge transport along the strand by hopping of holes from one base to another, and that this charge transport may be relevant to DNA regulation, damage detection and repair. A surprising amount of insight can be gained from the construction of simple tight-binding models of charge transport, which can be investigated using the transfer-matrix method. We review a set of ladder-like models for DNA charge transport and their extension to include more physically realistic diagonal-hopping terms. There appears to be a correlation between DNA charge-transport properties obtained from these models and the locations and frequency of disease-associated mutations in multiple genes. We present data on genes including p53 (the "guardian of the genome") and genes associated with retinoblastoma and cystic fibrosis.