dorsal/arxiv
View SchemaElectrostatic theory of viral self-assembly: a toy model
| Authors | Tao Hu, Rui Zhang, B. I. Shklovskii |
|---|---|
| Categories | |
| ArXiv ID | q-bio/0610009 |
| URL | https://arxiv.org/abs/q-bio/0610009 |
| DOI | 10.1016/j.physa.2008.01.010 |
| Journal | Physica A 387, 3059 (2008) |
Abstract
Viruses self-assemble from identical capsid proteins and their genome consisting, for example, of a long single stranded (ss) RNA. For a big class of T = 3 viruses capsid proteins have long positive N-terminal tails. We explore the role played by the Coulomb interaction between the brush of positive N-terminal tails rooted at the inner surface of the capsid and the negative ss RNA molecule. We show that viruses are most stable when the total contour length of ss RNA is close to the total length of the tails. For such a structure the absolute value of the total RNA charge is approximately twice larger than the charge of the capsid. This conclusion agrees with structural data.
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"abstract": "Viruses self-assemble from identical capsid proteins and their genome\nconsisting, for example, of a long single stranded (ss) RNA. For a big class of\nT = 3 viruses capsid proteins have long positive N-terminal tails. We explore\nthe role played by the Coulomb interaction between the brush of positive\nN-terminal tails rooted at the inner surface of the capsid and the negative ss\nRNA molecule. We show that viruses are most stable when the total contour\nlength of ss RNA is close to the total length of the tails. For such a\nstructure the absolute value of the total RNA charge is approximately twice\nlarger than the charge of the capsid. This conclusion agrees with structural\ndata.",
"arxiv_id": "q-bio/0610009",
"authors": [
"Tao Hu",
"Rui Zhang",
"B. I. Shklovskii"
],
"categories": [
"q-bio.BM",
"cond-mat.soft"
],
"doi": "10.1016/j.physa.2008.01.010",
"journal_ref": "Physica A 387, 3059 (2008)",
"title": "Electrostatic theory of viral self-assembly: a toy model",
"url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/q-bio/0610009"
},
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