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There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
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Prof. Massimiliano Di Ventra, University of California San Diego
Probing DNA in nanopores via tunneling: From sequencing to "quantum" analogies
School Colloquium
Fast and low-cost DNA sequencing methods would revolutionize medicine: a person could have his/her full genome sequenced so that drugs could be tailored to his/her specific illnesses; doctors could know in advance patients’ likelihood to develop a given ailment; cures to major diseases could be found faster [1]. However, this goal of “personalized medicine” is hampered today by the high cost and slow speed of DNA sequencing methods. In this talk, I will discuss the sequencing protocol we suggest which requires the measurement of the distributions of transverse currents during the translocation of single-stranded DNA into nanopores [2-5]. I will support our conclusions with a combination of molecular dynamics simulations coupled to quantum mechanical calculations of electrical current in experimentally realizable systems [2-5]. I will also discuss recent experiments that support these theoretical predictions. In addition, I will show how this relatively unexplored area of research at the interface between solids, liquids, and biomolecules at the nanometer length scale is a fertile ground to study quantum phenomena that have a classical counterpart, such as ionic quasi-particles, ionic “quantized” conductance [6,7] and Coulomb blockade [8].
[1] M. Zwolak, M. Di Ventra, Physical Approaches to DNA Sequencing and Detection, Rev. Mod. Phys. 80, 141 (2008).
[2] M. Zwolak and M. Di Ventra, Electronic signature of DNA nucleotides via transverse transport, Nano Lett. 5, 421 (2005).
[3] J. Lagerqvist, M. Zwolak, and M. Di Ventra, Fast DNA sequencing via transverse electronic transport, Nano Lett. 6, 779 (2006).
[4] J. Lagerqvist, M. Zwolak, and M. Di Ventra, Influence of the environment and probes on rapid DNA sequencing via transverse electronic transport, Biophys. J. 93, 2384 (2007).
[5] M. Krems, M. Zwolak, Y.V. Pershin, and M. Di Ventra, Effect of noise on DNA sequencing via transverse electronic transport, Biophys. J. 97, 1990, (2009).
[6] M. Zwolak, J. Lagerqvist, and M. Di Ventra, Ionic conductance quantization in nanopores, Phys. Rev.Lett. 103, 128102 (2009).
[7] M. Zwolak, J. Wilson, and M. Di Ventra, Dehydration and ionic conductance quantization in nanopores, J. Phys. Cond. Matt. 22 454126 (2011).
[8] M. Krems and M. Di Ventra, Ionic Coulomb blockade in nanopores arXiv:1103.2749.
