Hi Matt,

I have a post-doc candidate, David Argudo, interviewing this Friday from Penn. His background is in the mechanical behavior of DNA under force. Please feel free to share the information on his talk with your group - they are more than welcome to attemd if the topic is of any interest.

Cheers,

Michael

Speaker: David Argudo, University of Pennsylvania, Department of Mechanical Engineering (post-doc candidate in Grabe Lab)

Presentation Title : "The Mechanical Response of DNA: Twisting the Molecule"

Time: 10:30 am Friday January 24th, 2014

Room: 342 Smith Building (3rd floor)

Abstract: Since the structure of double stranded DNA was discovered about six decades ago, there have been great developments in the fields of biology, genetic engineering, molecular biology, biophysics and numerous others. It is the objective of our work to carry on with these developments by providing new insights and understanding of DNA behavior/function using mechanics as our primary tool. To achieve this goal we focus on building analytical models for DNA molecules using rod theory and statistical mechanics. We model a key experiment in which a tensile force is applied on the DNA while simultaneously twisting it using optical or magnetic tweezers. In these experiments, DNA has been seen to form helical structures (supercoils), collapse into tightly condensed structures (toroids) and undergo structural changes (phase transitions). Our work focuses on studying all these phenomena by accounting for DNA elasticity, entropic effects due to thermal fluctuations and electrostatics.

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Michael Grabe
Associate Professor
University of California, San Francisco
Cardiovascular Research Institute
Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry
555 Mission Bay Blvd South, Room 452T, MC 3122
San Francisco, California 94158-9001