Analytical description of finite size effects for RNA secondary structures

2003/04/30 by Tsunglin Liu, Ralf Bundschuh
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Physics and Astronomy · #Bacterial Genetics and Biotechnology #RNA Research and Splicing #RNA and protein synthesis mechanisms #cond-mat.stat-mech #physics.bio-ph #q-bio

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physreve.69.061912

published as Phys. Rev. E. 69 (2004), 061912 · 10 pages, 13 figures, published in Phys. Rev. E

openalex publication_date 2004/06/09 · arxiv created 2005/04/12 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

The ensemble of RNA secondary structures of uniform sequences is studied analytically. We calculate the partition function for very long sequences and discuss how the crossover length, beyond which asymptotic scaling laws apply, depends on thermodynamic parameters. For realistic choices of parameters this length can be much longer than natural RNA molecules. This has to be taken into account when applying asymptotic theory to interpret experiments or numerical results.

Citations

• Fast folding and comparison of RNA secondary structures
• THEORY OF PROTEIN FOLDING: The Energy Landscape Perspective

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