Knotted folds induced by homochiral all-parallel (or all-antiparallel) double-helices

Many biomolecules and their synthetic counterparts preferentially assemble into double-helices with a preferred handedness and parallelism, such as all-antiparallel, right-handed double-helical polymorphs of DNA and RNA favored under ambient conditions by Watson-Crick duplexing. We analyze knots formed by double-helices which are exclusively all-parallel (or exclusively all-antiparallel) and all right-handed (or all left-handed) . Most simpler knot enantiomers are unrealizable. Among the nearly 500 distinct knot enantiomers with up to 10 crossings, fewer than 10% can be formed by such double-helices. Simplest designs for the folding of admissible knot enantiomers via duplexing of complementary base pairs in single-stranded RNA (or DNA) are enumerated for those knots.

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Publication Details

Journal
PNAS Nexus
Published
2026-08-25
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgag278
Primary Topic
Supramolecular Chemistry and Complexes
Type
article
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article

Knotted folds induced by homochiral all-parallel (or all-antiparallel) double-helices

Stephen T. Hyde, Myfanwy E. Evans, N Taylor, Callum A R Metzke
PNAS Nexus
Supramolecular Chemistry and Complexes
article

Knotted folds induced by homochiral all-parallel (or all-antiparallel) double-helices

Stephen T. Hyde, Myfanwy E. Evans, N Taylor, Callum A R Metzke
article en

Abstract

Many biomolecules and their synthetic counterparts preferentially assemble into double-helices with a preferred handedness and parallelism, such as all-antiparallel, right-handed double-helical polymorphs of DNA and RNA favored under ambient conditions by Watson-Crick duplexing. We analyze knots formed by double-helices which are exclusively all-parallel (or exclusively all-antiparallel) and all right-handed (or all left-handed) . Most simpler knot enantiomers are unrealizable. Among the nearly 500 distinct knot enantiomers with up to 10 crossings, fewer than 10% can be formed by such double-helices. Simplest designs for the folding of admissible knot enantiomers via duplexing of complementary base pairs in single-stranded RNA (or DNA) are enumerated for those knots.

PNAS NexusVol. 5(8)
Australian National University (AU), The University of Sydney (AU), University of Potsdam (DE), UNSW Sydney (AU), University of Oxford (GB), Cooperative Trials Group for Neuro-Oncology (AU)
Openalex Percentile: Top 19%
Supramolecular Chemistry and Complexes
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Knotted folds induced by homochiral all-parallel (or all-antiparallel) double-helices — Stephen T. Hyde, Myfanwy E. Evans, et al. · PNAS Nexus (2026) | TGRS Research Map | TGRS