A Growth Model for Dna Evolution (submitted to Nature)
Abstract
We introduce a simple model for DNA evolution. Using the method of Peng et al.
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, we investigate the fractal properties of the system. For small chains and chains of intermediate size we find a fractal exponent that indicates the existence of long-range correlations, as in real DNA sequences. However, when very large chains are studied the fractal exponent asymptotically converge to the value of a random sequence. We verify that the mutations are responsible for the apparent existence of long-range correlations.