Dipartimento di Fisica e Matematica, Università dell'Insubria, Como, Italy.
Rep Prog Phys. 2012 Jul;75(7):076602. doi: 10.1088/0034-4885/75/7/076602. Epub 2012 Jun 28.
Recent experimental and theoretical approaches have attempted to quantify the physical organization (compaction and geometry) of the bacterial chromosome with its complement of proteins (the nucleoid). The genomic DNA exists in a complex and dynamic protein-rich state, which is highly organized at various length scales. This has implications for modulating (when not directly enabling) the core biological processes of replication, transcription and segregation. We overview the progress in this area, driven in the last few years by new scientific ideas and new interdisciplinary experimental techniques, ranging from high space- and time-resolution microscopy to high-throughput genomics employing sequencing to map different aspects of the nucleoid-related interactome. The aim of this review is to present the wide spectrum of experimental and theoretical findings coherently, from a physics viewpoint. In particular, we highlight the role that statistical and soft condensed matter physics play in describing this system of fundamental biological importance, specifically reviewing classic and more modern tools from the theory of polymers. We also discuss some attempts toward unifying interpretations of the current results, pointing to possible directions for future investigation.
最近的实验和理论方法试图用其蛋白质成分（拟核）来量化细菌染色体的物理组织（压缩和几何形状）。基因组 DNA 存在于一种复杂和动态的富含蛋白质的状态，在各种长度尺度上高度组织化。这对调节（如果不是直接实现的话）复制、转录和分离的核心生物过程具有重要意义。我们综述了这一领域的进展，这是近年来新的科学思想和新的跨学科实验技术推动的，范围从高空间和时间分辨率显微镜到高通量基因组学，利用测序来绘制与拟核相关相互作用组的不同方面。本文综述的目的是从物理学的角度，连贯地呈现广泛的实验和理论发现。特别是，我们强调统计和软凝聚态物理学在描述这个具有基本生物学重要性的系统中的作用，特别回顾了聚合物理论中的经典和更现代的工具。我们还讨论了一些统一当前结果解释的尝试，指出了未来研究的可能方向。
