Actin, a model semi-flexible polymer

TL;DR

This paper reviews actin as a semi-flexible polymer, highlighting its properties, dynamics, and rheology, and discusses how associated proteins regulate its length and crosslinking, making it an ideal model system.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of actin's physical properties, polymerization behavior, and the dynamics and rheology of actin solutions, emphasizing its suitability as a model system.

Findings

Actin has a persistence length over 10 microns.

Actin filaments can polymerize to tens of microns.

Associated proteins regulate actin filament length and crosslinking.

Abstract

Actin is a filamentary protein which has many remarkable properties making it an ideal system for the study of the dynamics and mechanics of semi-flexible polymer solutions and gels; actin has a persistence length of over 10 microns and can polymerize to lengths of several tens of microns, this permits the use of video microscopy and other optical methods in the study polymer dynamics. Many associated proteins exist which can be used to regulate length or crosslink filaments. We discuss the dynamics and rheology of these solutions.