Self-organized nanostructures constructed with a single polymer chain

Abstract A Monte Carlo simulation was performed on the folding transition of a single stiff polymer chain. We have adapted a polymer model: neighboring beads are connected by a stick and the length of each stick is taken as 1 8 of the Kuhn length. Among the products of the folding from the single chain, the toroidal structure is found to be the most stable. Rod and fused structures between rod and toroid are also generated as metastable states with almost infinite lifetime. These morphologies resemble the experimental structures observed with electron microscopy for the products of collapse from single duplex DNA chains.

[1]  K. Yoshikawa,et al.  Nucleation and Growth in Single DNA Molecules , 1996 .

[2]  R. Bundschuh,et al.  Fluctuations and Stiffness of Double-Stranded Polymers: Railway-Track Model , 1995 .

[3]  K. Marx,et al.  Studies of DNA organization in hydrated spermidine-condensed DNA toruses and spermidine-DNA fibres. , 1984, Journal of biomolecular structure & dynamics.

[4]  D. K. Chattoraj,et al.  DNA condensation with polyamines. II. Electron microscopic studies. , 1978, Journal of molecular biology.

[5]  K. Yoshikawa,et al.  Opposite effect between intercalator and minor groove binding drug on the higher order structure of DNA as is visualized by fluorescence microscopy. , 1992, Biochemical and biophysical research communications.

[6]  S. Kreitmeier,et al.  The collapse transition of a single polymer chain in two and three dimensions: A Monte Carlo study , 1996 .

[7]  Kurt Kremer,et al.  The nature of flexible linear polyelectrolytes in salt free solution: A molecular dynamics study , 1995 .

[8]  H. Stanley,et al.  Statistical physics of macromolecules , 1995 .

[9]  Artur Baumgärtner,et al.  Statics and dynamics of the freely jointed polymer chain with Lennard-Jones interaction , 1980 .

[10]  K. Yoshikawa,et al.  TRANSITION OF DOUBLE-STRANDED DNA CHAINS BETWEEN RANDOM COIL AND COMPACT GLOBULE STATES INDUCED BY COOPERATIVE BINDING OF CATIONIC SURFACTANT , 1995 .

[11]  Y. Kuznetsov,et al.  Kinetics at the collapse transition of homopolymers and random copolymers , 1995 .

[12]  V. Bloomfield,et al.  Condensation of DNA by trivalent cations. 1. Effects of DNA length and topology on the size and shape of condensed particles , 1990, Biopolymers.

[13]  A. Khokhlov,et al.  Some problems of the statistical physics of polymer chains with volume interaction , 1978 .

[14]  W. S. Ward,et al.  Deoxyribonucleic acid loop domain tertiary structure in mammalian spermatozoa. , 1993, Biology of reproduction.

[15]  Kenichi Yoshikawa,et al.  Collapse of single DNA molecule in poly(ethylene glycol) solutions , 1995 .

[16]  Y. Kuznetsov,et al.  New orientationally ordered phases of a homopolymer , 1996 .

[17]  Takahashi,et al.  Large discrete transition in a single DNA molecule appears continuous in the ensemble. , 1996, Physical review letters.

[18]  Andrzej Kolinski,et al.  The collapse transition of semiflexible polymers. A Monte Carlo simulation of a model system , 1986 .

[19]  N. Karasawa,et al.  Phase transitions in polymethylene single chains from Monte Carlo simulated annealing , 1988 .

[20]  P. Gennes.  Scaling Concepts in Polymer Physics , 1979 .

[21]  G. Plum,et al.  Condensation of DNA by trivalent cations. 2. Effects of cation structure , 1990, Biopolymers.

[22]  T. A. Kavassalis,et al.  A molecular-dynamics study of polyethylene crystallization , 1993 .

[23]  R. L. Baldwin,et al.  Cation-induced toroidal condensation of DNA studies with Co3+(NH3)6. , 1980, Journal of molecular biology.