“Worm-like chain”的意思、由来-开放百科全书

The worm-like chain (WLC) model in polymer physics is used to describe the behavior of polymers that are semi-flexible: fairly stiff with successive segments pointing in roughly the same direction, and with persistence length within a few orders of magnitude of the polymer length. The WLC model is the continuous version of the Kratky-Porod model.

Model elements

For a polymer of maximum length

, parametrize the path of the polymer as

. Allow

to be the unit tangent vector to the chain at point

, and

to be the position vector along the chain, as shown to the right. Then:

where

is the polymer's characteristic persistence length,

is the Boltzmann constant, and

is the absolute temperature. At finite temperatures, the end-to end distance of the polymer will be significantly shorter than the maximum length

. This is caused by thermal fluctuations, which result in a coiled, random configuration of the undisturbed polymer.

The polymer's orientation correlation function can then be solved for, and it follows an exponential decay with decay constant 1/P:^[1]^[3]

Note that in the limit of

, then

. This can be used to show that a Kuhn segment is equal to twice the persistence length of a worm-like chain. In the limit of

, then

, and the polymer displays rigid rod behavior.^[2] The figure to the right shows the crossover from flexible to stiff behavior as the persistence length increases.

Biological relevance

Experimental data from the stretching of Lambda phage DNA is shown to the right, with force measurements determined by analysis of Brownian fluctuations of a bead attached to the DNA. A persistence length of 51.35 nm and a contour length of 1318 nm were used for the model, which is depicted by the solid line.^[4]

Other biologically important polymers that can be effectively modeled as worm-like chains include:

Stretching worm-like chain polymers

Upon stretching, the accessible spectrum of thermal fluctuations reduces, which causes an entropic force acting against the external elongation.

This entropic force can be estimated from considering the total energy of the polymer:

Here, the contour length is represented by

, the persistence length by

, the extension is represented by

, and external force is represented by

Laboratory tools such as atomic force microscopy (AFM) and optical tweezers have been used to characterize the force-dependent stretching behavior of biological polymers. An interpolation formula that approximates the force-extension behavior with about 15% relative error is:^[10]

A more accurate approximation for the force-extension behavior with about 1% relative error is:^[11]

A corresponding approximation for the extension-force behavior, also with about 1% relative error, was reported:^[11]

Extensible worm-like chain model

The elastic response from extension cannot be neglected: polymers elongate due to external forces. This enthalpic compliance is accounted for the material parameter

, and the system yields the following Hamiltonian for significantly extended polymers:

This expression contains both the entropic term, which describes changes in the polymer conformation, and the enthalpic term, which describes the stretching of the polymer due to the external force.

Several approximations for the force-extension behavior have been put forward, depending on the applied external force. These approximations are made for stretching DNA in physiological conditions (near neutral pH, ionic strength approximately 100 mM, room temperature), with stretch modulus around 1000 pN.^[12]^[13]

For the low-force regime (F < about 10 pN), the following interpolation formula was derived:^[14]

For the higher-force regime, where the polymer is significantly extended, the following approximation is valid:^[15]

More accurate interpolation formulas for the force-extension and extension-force behaviors are:^[11]

See also

References

1. ^¹²³⁴{{cite book | author=Doi and Edwards | title=The Theory of Polymer Dynamics | year=1988}}
2. ^¹{{cite book | author=Rubinstein and Colby | title=Polymer Physics | year=2003}}
3. ^¹²³{{cite book | author=Kirby, B.J. | title=Micro- and Nanoscale Fluid Mechanics: Transport in Microfluidic Devices | url=http://www.kirbyresearch.com/textbook}}
4. ^¹{{cite journal|last1=Bouchiat|first1=C|title=Estimating the Persistence Length of a Worm-Like Chain Molecule from Force-Extension Measurements|journal=Biophysical Journal|volume=76|issue=1|pages=409–413|date=1999|doi=10.1016/S0006-3495(99)77207-3|url=https://www.cell.com/biophysj/fulltext/S0006-3495(99)77207-3|bibcode=1999BpJ....76..409B}}
5. ^{{cite journal | author=J. A. Abels and F. Moreno-Herrero and T. van der Heijden and C. Dekker and N. H. Dekker | title=Single-Molecule Measurements of the Persistence Length of Double-Stranded RNA | journal=Biophysical Journal| year=2005| volume=88| pages=2737–2744| doi=10.1529/biophysj.104.052811 | bibcode=2005BpJ....88.2737A}}
6. ^{{cite journal|last1=Bernard|first1=Tinland|title=Persistence Length of Single-Stranded DNA|journal=Macromolecules|date=1997|doi=10.1021/ma970381+}}
7. ^{{cite journal|last1=Chen|first1=Huimin|last2=Meisburger|first2=Steve P.|title=Ionic strength-dependent persistence lengths of single-stranded RNA and DNA|journal=PNAS|volume=109|issue=3|pages=799–804|date=2011|doi=10.1073/pnas.1119057109|pmid=22203973|pmc=3271905|bibcode=2012PNAS..109..799C}}
8. ^{{cite journal | author=L. J. Lapidus and P. J. Steinbach and W. A. Eaton and A. Szabo and J. Hofrichter | title=Single-Molecule Effects of Chain Stiffness on the Dynamics of Loop Formation in Polypeptides. Appendix: Testing a 1-Dimensional Diffusion Model for Peptide Dynamics | journal=Journal of Physical Chemistry B| year=2002| volume=106| pages=11628–11640| doi=10.1021/jp020829v}}
9. ^{{cite journal|last1=Gittes|first1=F|title=Flexural rigidity of microtubules and actin filaments measured from thermal fluctuations in shape|journal=Journal of Cell Biology|volume=120|issue=4|pages=923–934|date=1993|doi=10.1083/jcb.120.4.923}}
10. ^{{cite journal|last1=Marko|first1=J.F.|last2=Siggia|first2=E.D.|title=Statistical mechanics of supercoiled DNA|journal=Phys. Rev. E|volume=52|issue=3|pages=2912|date=1995|doi=10.1103/PhysRevE.52.2912|bibcode=1995PhRvE..52.2912M}}
11. ^¹²{{cite journal|last=Petrosyan|first=R.|title=Improved approximations for some polymer extension models|journal=Rehol Acta|volume=56|pages=21–26|year=2016|doi = 10.1007/s00397-016-0977-9|arxiv=1606.02519 }}
12. ^{{cite journal|last=Wang|first=Michelle D.|author2=Hong Yin|author3=Robert Landick|author4=Jeff Gelles|author5=Steven M. Block|year=1997|title=Stretching DNA with Optical Tweezers|journal=Biophysical Journal|volume=72|issue=3|pages=1335–1346|bibcode=1997BpJ....72.1335W|doi=10.1016/S0006-3495(97)78780-0|pmc=1184516|pmid=9138579}}
13. ^{{Cite journal | doi=10.1007/s12551-016-0236-4| pmid=28303166| pmc=5331113|title = Single-molecule studies of high-mobility group B architectural DNA bending proteins| journal=Biophysical Reviews| volume=9| issue=1| pages=17–40|year = 2017|last1 = Murugesapillai|first1 = Divakaran| last2=McCauley| first2=Micah J.| last3=Maher| first3=L. James| last4=Williams| first4=Mark C.}}
14. ^{{cite journal|last=Marko|first=J.F.|author2=Eric D. Siggia |title=Stretching DNA|journal=Macromolecules|year=1995|volume=28|issue=26|pages=8759–8770|bibcode = 1995MaMol..28.8759M |doi = 10.1021/ma00130a008 }}
15. ^{{cite journal|last=Odijk|first=Theo|title=Stiff Chains and Filaments under Tension|journal=Macromolecules|year=1995|volume=28|issue=20|pages=7016–7018|bibcode = 1995MaMol..28.7016O |doi = 10.1021/ma00124a044 |url=http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:2766c66f-fec4-4e02-81cd-12aec69d56b6}}

Model elements

Biological relevance

Stretching worm-like chain polymers

Extensible worm-like chain model

See also

References

Further reading