Conformational Dynamics of Chromatin Fibers: Comparison of Monte Carlo Simulations with Force Spectroscopy

To elucidate conformational dynamics of chromatin fibers, we compared available force-spectroscopy measurements with extensive Monte Carlo (MC) simulations of nucleosome arrays under external force. Our coarse-grained model of chromatin includes phenomenological energy terms for the DNA-histone adhesion and the inter-nucleosome stacking interactions. We found that the MC fiber ensembles simulated with increasing degrees of DNA unwrapping and the stacking energy 8 kT, can account for the intricate force-extension response observed experimentally.

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