Long Polymer Folded into Fractal Globule, Version #2

Long Polymer Folded into Fractal Globule, Version #2

Submitted by Miriam Huntley, Jian Li and Erez Lieberman Aiden of the Laboratory at Large in the Broad Institute

Broad Institute

Miriam Huntley, Jian Li and Erez Lieberman Aiden
Laboratory at Large, Broad Institute
Computer Recursion Drawing

"This image shows a long polymer folded into a fractal globule: extraordinarily dense, yet completely unknotted.  Experimental evidence suggests that the human genome folds into fractal globules in order to keep genetic information compact, yet accessible.  Our group is interested in understanding how DNA folds up inside the nucleus. Understanding how quantities such as the contact probability, radius of gyration, and surface area scale with the length of these curves is an important step in this endeavor."