Cooperative Assembly Systems

Several molecular systems form large-scale objects. One would like to understand their assembly and how this assembly is regulated. As a first step, we investigate the phase transition structure of a class of bipartite cooperative assembly systems. We characterize which of these systems have a (probabilistic) equilibrium and find an explicit form for their local energy (§2). We obtain, under additional limitations on cooperativity, the average dynamics of some partial observables (§4). Combining both steps, we obtain conditions for the phase transition to a large cluster (§5). Numerous intracelullar molecular systems (post-synaptic densities, bacterial chemotaxis sensors, or focal adhesion complexes) form extensive structures which are somewhat intermediate between traditional signalling complexes and largescale objects more familiar from statistical physics. One would like to understand the specific regulation controlling their assembly and how this regulation relates to theirs ...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2011
• Where: DNA
• Authors: Vincent Danos, Heinz Koeppl, John Wilson-Kanamori
• Keywords: Bioinformatics, Cooperative Assembly, DNA 2011, Reproduction Rate, Transition Structure