Trajectory approach to two-state kinetics of single particles on sculpted energy landscapes.
We study the trajectories of a single colloidal particle as it hops between two energy wells which are sculpted using optical traps. Whereas the dynamical behaviors of such systems are often treated by master-equation methods that focus on particles as actors, we analyze them instead using a trajectory-based variational method called maximum caliber (MaxCal). We show that the MaxCal strategy accurately predicts the full dynamics that we observe in the experiments: From the observed averages, it predicts second and third moments and covariances, with no free parameters. The covariances are the dynamical equivalents of Maxwell-like equilibrium reciprocal relations and Onsager-like dynamical relations.
California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, USA.
David
D
Wu
Kingshuk
K
Ghosh
Mandar
M
Inamdar
Heun Jin
HJ
Lee
Scott
S
Fraser
Ken
K
Dill
Rob
R
Phillips
D003102:Colloids / Q000737:chemistry*; D007700:Kinetics; D008956:Models, Chemical; D013816:Thermodynamics
D003102:Colloids