Atomic hydrodynamics of DNA: Coil-uncoil-coil transitions in a wall-bounded shear flow

Abstract

Extensive experimental work on the response of DNA molecules to externally applied forces and on the dynamics of DNA molecules flowing in microchannels and nanochannels has been carried out over the past two decades, however, there has not been available, until now, any atomic-scale means of analyzing nonequilibrium DNA response dynamics. There has not therefore been any way to investigate how the backbone and side-chain atoms along the length of a DNA molecule interact with the molecules and ions of the flowing solvent and with the atoms of passing boundary surfaces. We report here on the application of the nonequilibrium biomolecular dynamics simulation method that we developed [G. M. Wang and W. C. Sandberg, Nanotechnology 18, 4819 (2007)] to analyze, at the atomic interaction force level, the conformational dynamics of short-chain single-stranded DNA molecules in a shear flow near a surface. This is a direct atomic computational analysis of the hydrodynamic interaction between a biomolecule and a flowing solvent. The DNA molecules are observed to exhibit conformational behaviors including coils, hairpin loops, and figure-eight shapes that have neither been previously measured experimentally nor observed computationally, as far as we know. We relate the conformational dynamics to the atomic interaction forces experienced throughout the length of a molecule as it moves in the flowing solvent past the surface boundary. We show that the DNA conformational dynamics is related to the asymmetry in the molecular environment induced by the motion of the surrounding molecules and the atoms of the passing surface. We also show that while the asymmetry in the environment is necessary, it is not sufficient to produce the observed conformational dynamics. A time variation in the asymmetry, due in our case to a shear flow, must also exist. In order to contrast these results with the usual experimental situation of purely diffusive motion in thermal equilibrium we have also carried out computations with a zero shear rate. We show that in thermal equilibrium there is asymmetry and an atomic hydrodynamic coupling between DNA molecules and the solvent molecules but there is no coil-uncoil transition.