Friday, 6 March 2020 – 11:00 am in LT4, Level 2, School of Chemistry [Map].  (School  seminar)

Professor Stephen Hyde, The University of Sydney [Email: stephen.hyde@sydney.edu.au]

Host:  Prof Chiara Neto

Abstract:

Tangles rewound as helices. Some results
Structural tangling is a complicated, but fascinating, feature of many (macro)molecular materials, from metal-organic frameworks, to RNA, proteins and DNA. It is difficult to characterise, or enumerate. I have been developing a (theoretical) topological approach that characterises tangled threads, or loops, or networks, via windings on surfaces, from simple donut-shaped torus, to multi-holed surfaces.  The talk will introduce that concept for the simplest class of tangles, namely knots and links (tangled loops). Even in that class, interesting results emerge related to chirality, and realisation via DNA or RNA.