Helix untwisting and bubble formation in circular DNA

Abstract

The base pair fluctuations and helix untwisting are examined for a circular molecule. A realistic mesoscopic model including twisting degrees of freedom and bending of the molecular axis is proposed. The computational method, based on path integral techniques, simulates a distribution of topoisomers with various twist numbers and finds the energetically most favorable molecular conformation as a function of temperature. The method can predict helical repeat, openings loci and bubble sizes for specific sequences in a broad temperature range. Some results are presented for a short DNA circle recently identified in mammalian cells.