Dresden 2006 – scientific programme

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AKB: Biologische Physik

AKB 21: Intracellular Transport

AKB 21.4: Talk

Thursday, March 30, 2006, 11:30–11:45, ZEU 260

Traffic jams of molecular motors in tube-like compartments — •Melanie Müller, Stefan Klumpp, and Reinhard Lipowsky — Max-Planck-Institut für Kolloid- und Grenzflächenforschung, 14424 Potsdam

Processive molecular motors move along cytoskeletal filaments in a directed manner. However, even processive motors have only a finite walking distance after which they unbind from the filament and then undergo undirected diffusive motion in the surrounding aqueous solution. We consider theoretical models which map this interplay of directed and diffusive motion onto random walks on a lattice. Taking into account the mutual exclusion of the motors from the binding sites on the filament, this leads to variants of driven lattice gas models or exclusion processes, where the driving is localized to the filament.

Using analytical calculations and computer simulations, we obtain motor density and motor current profiles for several systems with different geometries. In particular, we study tube-like compartments which mimic the geometry of an axon. For high motor densities, the motors form traffic jams induced by their mutual exclusion, which leads to a reduction of the motor transport for high motor densities. The length of these traffic jams is determined as a function of the transport parameters of the motors.