Models of DNA denaturation dynamics: universal properties

TL;DR

This paper reviews various models of DNA denaturation dynamics, focusing on how different assumptions affect the dynamical exponent and its relation to experimental observations.

Contribution

It analyzes the impact of model simplifications, especially helical entanglement, on the dynamical exponent in DNA denaturation models.

Findings

Dynamical exponent z varies from 0 to approximately 3.3 across models.

Inclusion of helical entanglement influences the value of z.

Connections between models and experimental data are discussed.

Abstract

We briefly review some of the models used to describe DNA denaturation dynamics, focusing on the value of the dynamical exponent $z$, which governs the scaling of the characteristic time $\tau\sim L^z$ as a function of the sequence length $L$. The models contain different degrees of simplifications, in particular sometimes they do not include a description for helical entanglement: we discuss how this aspect influences the value of $z$, which ranges from $z=0$ to $z \approx 3.3$. Connections with experiments are also mentioned.