The physics of DNA supercoiling, and its relevance in DNA melting
The physics of DNA supercoiling, and its relevance in DNA melting
- Event time: 11:30am until 12:30pm
- Event date: 8th November 2017
- Speaker: Professor Davide Marenduzzo (School of Physics & Astronomy, University of Edinburgh)
- Location: Room 2511, James Clerk Maxwell Building (JCMB) James Clerk Maxwell Building Peter Guthrie Tait Road Edinburgh EH9 3FD GB
Event details
I will introduce the concept of linking number of a ribbon with a simple demonstration, and discuss how this is applied to a double-stranded DNA molecule, and how it is useful to introduce the idea of supercoiling. We will discuss some practical examples of White's linking number theorem, which starts from the observation that the linking number is a topological invariant in a closed ribbon. We shall finally see an application of these ideas to a Landau-Ginzburg theory for the melting of circular DNA.
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