%0 Journal Article
%A Malyshev, Andrey
%A Díaz García, Elena
%A Domínguez-Adame Acosta, Francisco
%T Effects of the environment on the electric conductivity of double-stranded DNA molecules
%D 2009
%@ 0953-8984
%U https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/45066
%X We present a theoretical analysis of the effects of the environment on charge transport in double-stranded synthetic poly(G)-poly(C) DNA molecules attached to two ideal leads. Coupling of the DNA to the environment results in two effects: (i) localization of carrier functions due to static disorder and (ii) phonon-induced scattering of the carriers between the localized states, resulting in hopping conductivity. A nonlinear Pauli master equation for populations of localized states is used to describe the hopping transport and calculate the electric current as a function of the applied bias. We demonstrate that, although the electronic gap in the density of states shrinks as the disorder increases, the voltage gap in the I-V characteristics becomes wider. A simple physical explanation of this effect is provided.
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