Active transport in complex media: relationship between persistence and superdiffusion

MARCELO A. DESPÓSITO; CARLA PALLAVICINI; VALERIA LEVI; LUCIANA BRUNO

PHYSICA A - STATISTICAL AND THEORETICAL PHYSICS

ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV

Año: 2011 vol. 390 p. 1026 - 1032

0378-4371

We study the relationship between anomalous diffusion and persistent motion of micron- sized particles moving in a viscoelastic environment and subjected to an external noise. In the framework of a generalized Langevin equation, we compare the analytical expres- sions of the mean square displacement and the mean cosine of the turning angle. Both magnitudes can be easily computed from the particles trajectories, and allow us to inves- tigate the different anomalous regimes typically obtained, for instance, in single particle tracking experiments within living cells. Finally, we analyze the directional changes occur- ring during the motion of pigment organelles driven by molecular motors in Xenopuslaevismelanocytes, as an example of application of our model.