Figure 4.

Telomeric G4 folding and unfolding kinetics and stability. (A) Green solid circles indicate experimental measured p_fold(t) at 5 pN. Black curve is the predicted p_fold(t) based on the sequential model in (B), which is the sum of the probabilities of the long-lived state (L, blue curve) and the short-lived state (S, purple curve). (B) Sketch of the sequential transition model, in which the long-lived state, short-lived state and ultra-long-lived state are indicated by ‘L’, ‘S’ and ‘UL’, respectively. (C) Filled circles of different colors indicate experimental p_fold(t) measured at different forces. Each data point was calculated based on more than 100 refolding/unfolding cycles from at least four molecules. The solid lines with corresponding colors are best fitting based on the Master equation of the sequential model. (D) The fitted k₁₂ (red solid circles) and k₃₂ (blue solid circles) at different forces. The black triangles are k_u → f determined in dwell time analysis at constant forces of 5, 6 and 7 pN, respectively. The open and solid cyan triangles are k_{f → u, short} and k_{f → u, long} of the short-lived (open triangle) and long-lived (solid triangle) states, respectively, which are directly determined by dwell time analysis. X-axis error bars reflect a ∼10% error in force determination. Y-axis error bars are the standard deviation.