Diffusion and reaction in crowded environments
Autores: C. Echeverría, K. Tucci, R. Kapral
Referencia:
Journal of Physics: Condens Matter, 19, 065146, (2007)
Abstract
The effects of molecular crowding on small
molecule diffusion and chemical reaction rate coefficients
are investigated. The systems considered comprise a random
distribution of stationary spherical obstacles occupying a
volume fraction phi of the system and a large number of
small molecules whose dynamics are followed. Chemical
reactions are studied in such crowded systems where, in
addition to the obstacles, a large reactive sphere C is
present that catalyses the reaction A+C \rightarrow B+C .
Using a mesoscopic description of the dynamics employing
multiparticle collisions among the small molecules, the \phi
dependence of the diffusion and reaction rate coefficients
is computed. Both the diffusion and reaction rate coefficients
decrease with increase of the obstacle volume fraction as
expected but variations of these quantities with phi are not
predicted by simple models of the dynamics.
|