Premium
Dynamics of Biological Polyelectrolytes
Author(s) -
Pecora R.
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
macromolecular symposia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.257
H-Index - 76
eISSN - 1521-3900
pISSN - 1022-1360
DOI - 10.1002/masy.200551103
Subject(s) - polyelectrolyte , dispersity , polymer , dynamic light scattering , fluorescence correlation spectroscopy , macromolecule , chemical physics , dynamics (music) , oligonucleotide , chemistry , fluorescence , diffusion , materials science , dna , nanotechnology , polymer chemistry , molecule , physics , optics , nanoparticle , organic chemistry , thermodynamics , biochemistry , acoustics
Summary: Biological polymers and structures, including proteins and DNAs, can be made in essentially monodisperse form. Proteins usually have well‐defined shapes. Duplex oligonucleotides are rigid and rodlike, and longer DNAs are semiflexible coils. The DNAs also constitute a homologous series. The dynamics of both proteins and DNAs can be studied by readily available techniques such as dynamic light scattering (DLS) and fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS). These systems can thus be used as model systems to elucidate elusive charge effects on the dynamics of macromolecules in solution (polyelectrolyte effects) for both rigid and semiflexible polymers. We present here as examples the results of measurements of mutual and self‐diffusion coefficients dynamics of a rodlike oligonucleotide as functions of polymer concentration and the concentration of added salt (which screens the charges).