Noise-Activated Fast Locomotion of DNA through the Frictional Landscape of Nanoporous Gels

It is hypothesized that nonlinear solid friction between the gel matrix and DNA molecules inhibits the motion of DNA through the nanopores of the gel during electrophoresis. In this article, it is demonstrated that external noise can alleviate the effect of solid friction, thus enhancing the mobility of DNA in an electrophoretic setting. In the presence of noise, the mobility of DNA increases by more than ∼113% compared to conventional electrophoresis. Although at a high power of noise, DNA exhibits Arrhenius kinetics, at a low power of noise, super-Arrhenius kinetics suggests the collective behavior of the activated motion of DNA molecules. A stochastic simulation following modified Langevin dynamics with the asymmetric pore size distribution of the agarose gel successfully predicts the mobility of DNA molecules and reveals the salient features of the overall dynamics. This "noise lubricity" may have a broader applicability from molecular to macroscopic locomotion.