No Arabic abstract
A variety of natural phenomena comprises a huge number of competing reactions and short-lived intermediates. Any study of such processes requires the discovery and accurate modeling of their underlying reaction network. However, this task is challenging due to the complexity in exploring all the possible pathways and the high computational cost in accurately modeling a large number of reactions. Fortunately, very often these processes are dominated by only a limited subset of the networks reaction pathways. In this work we propose a novel computationally inexpensive method to identify and select the key pathways of complex reaction networks, so that high-level ab-initio calculations can be more efficiently targeted at these critical reactions. The method estimates the relative importance of the reaction pathways for given reactants by analyzing the accelerated evolution of hundreds of replicas of the system and detecting products formation. This acceleration-detection method is able to tremendously speed up the reactivity of uni- and bimolecular reactions, without requiring any previous knowledge of products or transition states. Importantly, the method is efficiently iterative, as it can be straightforwardly applied for the most frequently observed products, therefore providing an efficient algorithm to identify the key reactions of extended chemical networks. We verified the validity of our approach on three different systems, including the reactivity of t-decalin with a methyl radical, and in all cases the expected behavior was recovered within statistical error.
The concept of the limiting step is extended to the asymptotology of multiscale reaction networks. Complete theory for linear networks with well separated reaction rate constants is developed. We present algorithms for explicit approximations of eigenvalues and eigenvectors of kinetic matrix. Accuracy of estimates is proven. Performance of the algorithms is demonstrated on simple examples. Application of algorithms to nonlinear systems is discussed.
In this study, we analyze how changes in the geometry of a potential energy surface in terms of depth and flatness can affect the reaction dynamics. We formulate depth and flatness in the context of one and two degree-of-freedom (DOF) Hamiltonian normal form for the saddle-node bifurcation and quantify their influence on chemical reaction dynamics. In a recent work, Garcia-Garrido, Naik, and Wiggins illustrated how changing the well-depth of a potential energy surface (PES) can lead to a saddle-node bifurcation. They have shown how the geometry of cylindrical manifolds associated with the rank-1 saddle changes en route to the saddle-node bifurcation. Using the formulation presented here, we show how changes in the parameters of the potential energy control the depth and flatness and show their role in the quantitative measures of a chemical reaction. We quantify this role of the depth and flatness by calculating the ratio of the bottleneck-width and well-width, reaction probability (also known as transition fraction or population fraction), gap time (or first passage time) distribution, and directional flux through the dividing surface (DS) for small to high values of total energy. The results obtained for these quantitative measures are in agreement with the qualitative understanding of the reaction dynamics.
Text-book concepts of diffusion- versus kinetic-control are well-defined for reaction-kinetics involving macroscopic concentrations of diffusive reactants that are adequately described by rate-constants -- the inverse of the mean-first-passage-time to the reaction-event. In contradistinction, an open important question is whether the mean-first-passage-time alone is a sufficient measure for biochemical reactions that involve nanomolar reactant concentrations. Here, using a simple yet generic, exactly-solvable model we study the conspiratory effect of diffusion and chemical reaction-limitations on the full reaction-time distribution. We show that it has a complex structure with four distinct regimes delimited by three characteristic time scales spanning a window of several decades. Consequently, the reaction-times are defocused: no unique time-scale characterises the reaction-process, diffusion- and kinetic-control can no longer be disentangled, and it is imperative to know the full reaction-time distribution. We introduce the concepts of geometry- and reaction-control, and also quantify each regime by calculating the corresponding reaction depth.
Electrostatic reaction inhibition in heterogeneous catalysis emerges if charged reactants and products are adsorbed on the catalyst and thus repel the approaching reactants. In this work, we study the effects of electrostatic inhibition on the reaction rate of unimolecular reactions catalyzed on the surface of a spherical model nanoparticle by using particle-based reaction-diffusion simulations. Moreover, we derive closed rate equations based on approximate Debye-Smoluchowski rate theory, valid for diffusion-controlled reactions, and a modified Langmuir adsorption isotherm, relevant for reaction-controlled reactions, to account for electrostatic inhibition in the Debye-Huckel limit. We study the kinetics of reactions ranging from low to high adsorptions on the nanoparticle surface and from the surface- to diffusion-controlled limits for charge valencies 1 and 2. In the diffusion-controlled limit, electrostatic inhibition drastically slows down the reactions for strong adsorption and low ionic concentration, which is well described by our theory. In particular, the rate decreases with adsorption affinity, because in this case the inhibiting products are generated at high rate. In the (slow) reaction-controlled limit, the effect of electrostatic inhibition is much weaker, as semi-quantitatively reproduced by our electrostatic-modified Langmuir theory. We finally propose and verify a simple interpolation formula that describes electrostatic inhibition for all reaction speeds (`diffusion-influenced reactions) in general.
Many biochemical and industrial applications involve complicated networks of simultaneously occurring chemical reactions. Under the assumption of mass action kinetics, the dynamics of these chemical reaction networks are governed by systems of polynomial ordinary differential equations. The steady states of these mass action systems have been analysed via a variety of techniques, including elementary flux mode analysis, algebraic techniques (e.g. Groebner bases), and deficiency theory. In this paper, we present a novel method for characterizing the steady states of mass action systems. Our method explicitly links a networks capacity to permit a particular class of steady states, called toric steady states, to topological properties of a related network called a translated chemical reaction network. These networks share their reaction stoichiometries with their source network but are permitted to have different complex stoichiometries and different network topologies. We apply the results to examples drawn from the biochemical literature.