Tubulin dipole moment, dielectric constant and quantum behavior: computer simulations, experimental results and suggestions. Conference Paper uri icon

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 |p(alpha)| = 552D, |p(beta)| = 1193D and |p(alphabeta)| = 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 Deltan/Deltac approximately 1.800 x 10(-3)ml/mg. The refractive index of tubulin was measured to be n(tub) approximately 2.90 and the high-frequency tubulin dielectric constant k(tub) approximately 8.41, while the high-frequency polarizability was found to be alpha(tub) approximately 2.1 x 10(-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.

published proceedings

  • Biosystems

altmetric score

  • 0.25

author list (cited authors)

  • Mershin, A., Kolomenski, A. A., Schuessler, H. A., & Nanopoulos, D. V.

citation count

  • 61

complete list of authors

  • Mershin, A||Kolomenski, AA||Schuessler, HA||Nanopoulos, DV

publication date

  • November 2004