2009/05/31 by Tibor Antal, T. Antal, P. L. Krapivsky +1 · 1 citation
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Engineering · Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Adhesion, Friction, and Surface Interactions #Force Microscopy Techniques and Applications #Geometric and Algebraic Topology #cond-mat.stat-mech #physics.bio-ph #q-bio.QM
paper · pdf · doi:10.1016/j.jtbi.2009.08.021
published as Journal Theoretical Biology 261, 488-493 (2009) · 9 pages, 4 figures. version 2 has minor changes in response to referee comments
arxiv created 2009/08/12 · openalex publication_date 2009/08/27 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
We construct a tractable model to describe the rate at which a knotted polymer is ejected from a spherical capsid via a small pore. Knots are too large to fit through the pore and must reptate to the end of the polymer for ejection to occur. The reptation of knots is described by symmetric exclusion on the line, with the internal capsid pressure represented by an additional biased particle that drives knots to the end of the chain. We compute the exact ejection speed for a finite number of knots L and find that it scales as 1/L. We also construct a continuum theory for many knots that matches the exact discrete theory for large L.