Related Experiment Video
Updated: Feb 23, 2026

Synthesis of Cyclic Polymers and Characterization of Their Diffusive Motion in the Melt State at the Single Molecule Level
Published on: September 26, 2016
Length and sequence relaxation of copolymers under recombination reactions
Alex Blokhuis1, David Lacoste1
1Gulliver Laboratory, UMR CNRS 7083, PSL Research University, ESPCI, 10 rue Vauquelin, F-75231 Paris, France.
Abstract:
We describe the kinetics and thermodynamics of copolymers undergoing recombination reactions, which are important for prebiotic chemistry. We use two approaches: the first one, based on chemical rate equations and the mass-action law describes the infinite size limit, while the second one, based on the chemical master equation, describes systems of finite size. We compare the predictions of both approaches for the relaxation of thermodynamic quantities towards equilibrium. We find that for some choice of initial conditions, the entropy of the sequence distribution can be lowered at the expense of increasing the entropy of the length distribution. We consider mainly energetically neutral reactions, except for one simple case of non-neutral reactions.
More Related Videos
Related Concept Videos
Homologous Recombination
Characteristics and Nomenclature of Copolymers
Conservative Site-specific Recombination and Phase Variation
The recognition sites for Cre recombinase called LoxP...
Polymers
Radical Chain-Growth Polymerization: Mechanism
Free-Radical Chain Reaction and Polymerization of Alkenes

