Temperature effects on the Davydov soliton

Abstract

As a possible mechanism for energy storage and transport in proteins, Davydov has proposed soliton formation and propagation. In this paper we investigate the stability of Davydov solitons at biological temperatures. From Davydov's original theory evolution equations are derived quantum mechanically without approximations, and their numerical solutions at different temperatures are presented. Our conclusion is that the Davydov soliton is stable at 310 K.