Hydrodynamic Radius Fluctuations in Model DNA-Grafted Nanoparticles

Fernando Vargas-Lara; Francis W Starr; Jack F Douglas

doi:10.1063/1.4949655

Hydrodynamic Radius Fluctuations in Model DNA-Grafted Nanoparticles

AIP Conf Proc. 2016;1736(1):020080. doi: 10.1063/1.4949655.

Authors

Fernando Vargas-Lara^{1

2}, Francis W Starr², Jack F Douglas¹

Affiliations

¹ Materials Science and Engineering Division, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD, 20899, USA.
² Department of Physics and Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT, 06459, USA.

Abstract

We utilize molecular dynamics simulations (MD) and the path-integration program ZENO to quantify hydrodynamic radius (R_h) fluctuations of spherical symmetric gold nanoparticles (NPs) decorated with single-stranded DNA chains (ssDNA). These results are relevant to understanding fluctuation-induced interactions among these NPs and macromolecules such as proteins. In particular, we explore the effect of varying the ssDNA-grafted NPs structural parameters, such as the chain length (L), chain persistence length (l_p), NP core size (R), and the number of chains (N) attached to the nanoparticle core. We determine R_h fluctuations by calculating its standard deviation (σ_R_{_h} ) of an ensemble of ssDNA-grafted NPs configurations generated by MD. For the parameter space explored in this manuscript, σ_R_{_h} shows a peak value as a function of N, the amplitude of which depends on L, l_p and R, while the broadness depends on R.

Grants and funding

9999-NIST/Intramural NIST DOC/United States