Title: Monte Carlo applications to thermal and chemical denaturation experiments of nucleic acids and proteins
Abstract: This chapter describes the Monte Carlo applications to thermal and chemical denaturation experiments of nucleic acids and proteins. Information about the states of systems must often be extracted indirectly, from the measurements of properties, considered characteristic of these states. However, even for systems, with stable, well-defined states, the ability to determine the true value of any property is complicated by errors in the measurement process. Statistical fluctuations due to processes on the molecular scale may further obfuscate attempts to determine the most likely (probable) value of the property under consideration. As an example of this process, the chapter considers the measurement of the absorbance of a ribonucleic acid (RNA) solution under constant solution conditions (constant temperature, pH, salt concentration, and nucleic acid concentration). Nucleic acid structural transitions are commonly monitored, by absorbance measurements, in the ultraviolet region of the spectrum, from which the changes in species fractions can be extracted and enthalpy, entropy, and free-energy changes of unfolding calculated.
Publication Year: 2000
Publication Date: 2000-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref', 'pubmed']
Access and Citation
Cited By Count: 32
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