Search results for "Molecular Motors"
showing 4 items of 4 documents
Tuning active Brownian motion with shot noise energy pulses
2009
The main aim of this work is to explore the possibility of modeling the biological energy support mediated by absorption of ATP (adenosine triphosphate) as an energetic shot noise. We develop a general model with discrete input of energy pulses and study shot-noise-driven ratchets. We consider these ratchets as prototypes of Brownian motors driven by energy-rich ATP molecules. Our model is a stochastic machine able to acquire energy from the environment and convert it into kinetic energy of motion. We present characteristic features and demonstrate the possibility of tuning these motors by adapting the mean frequency of the discrete energy inputs, which are described as a special shot noise…
Helix Inversion Controlled by Molecular Motors in Multistate Liquid Crystals.
2020
Unravelling the rules of molecular motion is a contemporary challenge that promises to support the development of responsive materials and is likely to enhance the understanding of functional motion. Advances in integrating light‐driven molecular motors in soft matter have led to the design and realization of chiral nematic (cholesteric) liquid crystals that can respond to light with modification of their helical pitch, and also with helix inversion. Under illumination, these chiral liquid crystals convert from one helical geometry to another. Here, a series of light‐driven molecular motors that feature a rich configurational landscape is presented, specifically which involves three stable …
Characteristics of the polymer transport in ratchet systems
2010
Molecules with complex internal structure in time-dependent periodic potentials are studied by using short Rubinstein-Duke model polymers as an example. We extend our earlier work on transport in stochastically varying potentials to cover also deterministic potential switching mechanisms, energetic efficiency and non-uniform charge distributions. We also use currents in the non-equilibrium steady state to identify the dominating mechanisms that lead to polymer transportation and analyze the evolution of the macroscopic state (e.g., total and head-to-head lengths) of the polymers. Several numerical methods are used to solve the master equations and nonlinear optimization problems. The domina…
Age affects myosin relaxation states in skeletal muscle fibers of female but not male mice
2018
The recent discovery that myosin has two distinct states in relaxed muscle–disordered relaxed (DRX) and super-relaxed (SRX)–provides another factor to consider in our fundamental understanding of the aging mechanism in skeletal muscle, since myosin is thought to be a potential contributor to dynapenia (age-associated loss of muscle strength independent of atrophy). The primary goal of this study was to determine the effects of age on DRX and SRX states and to examine their sex specificity. We have used quantitative fluorescence microscopy of the fluorescent nucleotide analog 2′/3′-O-(N-methylanthraniloyl) ATP (mantATP) to measure single-nucleotide turnover kinetics of myosin in skinned skel…