TY - JOUR
T1 - Strain softening in stretched DNA
AU - Luan, Binquan
AU - Aksimentiev, Aleksei
PY - 2008/9/10
Y1 - 2008/9/10
N2 - The microscopic mechanics of DNA stretching was characterized using extensive molecular dynamics simulations. By employing an anisotropic pressure-control method, realistic force-extension dependences of effectively infinite DNA molecules were obtained. A coexistence of B and S DNA domains was observed during the overstretching transition. The simulations revealed that strain softening may occur in the process of stretching torsionally constrained DNA. The latter observation was qualitatively reconciled with available experimental data using a random-field Ising model.
AB - The microscopic mechanics of DNA stretching was characterized using extensive molecular dynamics simulations. By employing an anisotropic pressure-control method, realistic force-extension dependences of effectively infinite DNA molecules were obtained. A coexistence of B and S DNA domains was observed during the overstretching transition. The simulations revealed that strain softening may occur in the process of stretching torsionally constrained DNA. The latter observation was qualitatively reconciled with available experimental data using a random-field Ising model.
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U2 - 10.1103/PhysRevLett.101.118101
DO - 10.1103/PhysRevLett.101.118101
M3 - Article
C2 - 18851334
AN - SCOPUS:51749090178
SN - 0031-9007
VL - 101
JO - Physical review letters
JF - Physical review letters
IS - 11
M1 - 118101
ER -