Tubulin dipole moment, dielectric constant and quantum behavior: computer simulations, experimental results and suggestions

Abstract

We used computer simulation to calculate the electric dipole moments of the alpha and beta tubulin monomers and dimer and found those to be |palpha|=552D, |pbeta|=1193D and |palpha-beta|=1740D respectively. Independent surface plasmon resonance (SPR) and refractometry measurements of the high-frequency dielectric constant and polarizability strongly corroborated our previous SPR-derived results giving delta-n/delta-c ~1.800x10^-3 ml/mg. The refractive index of tubulin was measured to be n_tub ~2.90 and the high frequency tubulin dielectric constant kappa_tub ~8.41 while the high-frequency polarizability was found to be alpha_tub ~ 2.1x10^-33 C m^2/V. Methods for the experimental determination of the low-frequency p are explored as well as ways to test the often conjectured quantum coherence and entanglement properties of tubulin. Biobits, bioqubits and other applications to bioelectronics are discussed.