The impact of monovalent ion force field model in nucleic acids simulations

A coarse-grain three-site-per-nucleotide model for DNA with explicit ions

The "three sites per nucleotide" (3SPN) model provides a coarse-grained representation of nucleic acids for simulation of molecular processes. Previously, this model has relied on an implicit representation of the surrounding ionic environment at the level of Debye-Hückel theory. In this work, we eliminate this limitation and present an explicit representation of ions, both monovalent and divalent. The coarse-grain ion-ion and ion-phosphate potential energy functions are inferred from all-atom simulations and parameterized to reproduce key features of the local structure and organization of ions in bulk water and in the presence of DNA. The resulting model, 3SPN.1-I, is capable of reproducing the local structure observed in detailed atomistic simulations, as well as the experimental melting temperature of DNA for a range of DNA oligonucleotide lengths, CG-content, Na(+) concentration, and Mg(2+) concentration.

Understanding RNA Flexibility Using Explicit Solvent Simulations: The Ribosomal and Group I Intron Reverse Kink-Turn Motifs

Reverse kink-turn is a recurrent elbow-like RNA building block occurring in the ribosome and in the group I intron. Its sequence signature almost matches that of the conventional kink-turn. However, the reverse and conventional kink-turns have opposite directions of bending. The reverse kink-turn lacks basically any tertiary interaction between its stems. We report unrestrained, explicit solvent molecular dynamics simulations of ribosomal and intron reverse kink-turns (54 simulations with 7.4 μs of data in total) with different variants (ff94, ff99, ff99bsc0, ff99χOL, and ff99bsc0χOL) of the Cornell et al. force field. We test several ion conditions and two water models. The simulations characterize the directional intrinsic flexibility of reverse kink-turns pertinent to their folded functional geometries. The reverse kink-turns are the most flexible RNA motifs studied so far by explicit solvent simulations which are capable at the present simulation time scale to spontaneously and reversibly sample a wide range of geometries from tightly kinked ones through flexible intermediates up to extended, unkinked structures. A possible biochemical role of the flexibility is discussed. Among the tested force fields, the latest χOL variant is essential to obtaining stable trajectories while all force field versions lacking the χ correction are prone to a swift degradation toward senseless ladder-like structures of stems, characterized by high-anti glycosidic torsions. The type of explicit water model affects the simulations considerably more than concentration and the type of ions.

Analysis of a DNA simulation model through hairpin melting experiments

We compare the predictions of a two-bead Brownian dynamics simulation model to melting experiments of DNA hairpins with complementary AT or GC stems and noninteracting loops in buffer A. This system emphasizes the role of stacking and hydrogen bonding energies, which are characteristics of DNA, rather than backbone bending, stiffness, and excluded volume interactions, which are generic characteristics of semiflexible polymers. By comparing high throughput data on the open-close transition of various DNA hairpins to the corresponding simulation data, we (1) establish a suitable metric to compare the simulations to experiments, (2) find a conversion between the simulation and experimental temperatures, and (3) point out several limitations of the model, including the lack of G-quartets and cross stacking effects. Our approach and experimental data can be used to validate similar coarse-grained simulation models.