Daniel P. Aalberts

Associate Professor of Physics

at Williams since 1997

Contact Information

Education/Experience

2007-2008 Courses

Courses given previously


Research interests

Biological polymers, studied with statistical and computational physics techniques.

Binding and Splicing mRNA

The famous double helical shape of DNA arises when the bases of the two complementary strands pair. Base-pairing is also the key to allowing special sites of mRNA to be recognized and we have developed a tool BINDIGO to efficiently calculate optimal binding free energies of RNA oligomeric fragments. To predict mRNA splice sites, we have used physical chemical models (Finding with Binding) and a novel statistical method (Primary Sequence Ranking).
[Supported by a grant from the National Institutes of Health (GM080690)]

Improving RNA Pseudoknot Models and Algorithms

In today's biology, RNA provides the link between DNA and proteins, modulates gene expression, and catalyzes certain reactions. RNA is a long, thin molecule which folds into complex, compact shapes through complementary base pairing. Hairpin or tree-like folds (Fig a) emerge most often, but occasionally the more complicated pseudoknot fold (Fig b) appears.

Pseudoknots are not common, but have amazing functionality when they do appear, catalyzing reactions as enzymes or performing other gene regulation functions. For example, the core of most catalytic RNAs is the interesting pseudoknot fold. Pseudoknots cannot be predicted using traditional RNA folding algorithms. Aalberts and his students have been improving models of pseudoknot structures and have been computing how abundant pseudoknots are.
[Supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation (MCB 0641995)]


The figures depict the molecular backbone and the base pairs.

Physics of Vision:

Rhodopsin, the optically active molecule in our eyes, changes shape when it absorbs a photon. This is the fastest photochemical reaction known --- 200 femtoseconds, less than the time it takes light to cross the width of your hair. Rhodopsin is a highly efficient system with very little noise which is one of the reasons we see when our rod cells are stimulated by only a few photons. I have been developing quantum mechanical models to study how absorption of light creates compact, coherent excitations called solitons and how these may induce the molecular shape change.
[Supported with a Cottrell College Science Award by the Research Corporation]

Selected publications

Thesis Students

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Biography

Curriculum Vitae


Williams Physics

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