Long-distance charge transport through DNA. An extended hopping
model*
Bernd Giese**, Martin Spichty, and Stefan Wessely
Department of Chemistry, University of Basel, St. Johanns
Ring 19, CH-4056 Basel, Switzerland
Abstract: Long-distance transfer of a positive charge through
DNA can be described by a hopping model. In double strands where the
(A:T)n bridges between the guanines are short (n 3), the charge hops
only between guanines, and each hopping step depends strongly upon the
guanine to guanine distances. In strands where the (A:T)n sequences
between the guanines are rather long (n 4), also the adenines act as
charge carriers. To predict the yields of the H2O-trapping products
one has to take into account not only the charge-transfer rates but
also the rates of H2O-trapping reactions.
*Lecture presented at the XVIIIth IUPAC Symposium on
Photochemistry, Dresden, German , 22-27 July 2000.Other presentations
are published in this issue, pp.395-548.
** Corresponding author