We introduce a novel heuristic global optimization method, energy landscape paving (ELP), which combines core ideas from energy surface deformation and tabu search. In appropriate limits, ELP reduces to existing techniques. The approach is very general and flexible and is illustrated here on two protein folding problems. For these examples, the technique gives faster convergence to the global minimum than previous approaches.
The dynamical properties of double-stranded DNA are studied in the framework of the Peyrard-Bishop-Dauxois model using Langevin dynamics. Our simulations are analyzed in terms of two distribution functions describing localized separations ("bubbles") of the double strand. The result that the bubble distributions are more sharply peaked at the active sites than thermodynamically obtained distributions is ascribed to the fact that the bubble lifetimes affect the distributions. Certain base-pair sequences are found to promote long-lived bubbles, and we argue that this is a result of length scale competition between the nonlinearity and disorder present in the system.
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