Honglei Zhang, Robin Curtis, and Leo Lue. School of Chemical Engineering and Analytical Science, The University of Manchester, PO Box 88, Sackville St,, Manchester, United Kingdom
Helices are the most commonly occuring secondary structures in proteins. The understanding of the structure nature of helix formaiton is crucial for biological research. In our study, we performed monte carlo simulation on polymer systems both with and without charges. The results showed that by adding charge on the polymer chain, the helix coil transition happens more readily and sharper than the uncharged ones. More potential is needed to in order to form helix with charged polymer. Salt effect was performed by putting screening factors in the potential. Phase diagram was obtained with both systems. Potential of mean force was generated by patch umbrella potential histograms together. Both internal energy and entropy contributions were obtained.