Movements of molecular motors on cytoskeletal filaments are described by directed walks on a line. Detachment from this line is allowed to occur with a small probability. Motion in the surrounding fluid is described by symmetric random walks. Effects of detachment and reattachment are calculated...

A hopping model for molecular motors is presented consisting of a state with asymmetric hopping rates with period 2 and a state with uniform hopping rates. State changes lead to a stationary unidirectional current of a particle. The current is explicitly calculated as a function of the rate of...

Diffusion of transported particles in the intracellular medium is described by means of a generalized diffusion equation containing forces due to the cytoskeleton network and to the protein motors. We find that the enhanced diffusion observed in experiments depends on the nature of the force...

By analytical methods we study the large time properties of the solution of a simple one-dimensional model of stochastic Stokes’ drift. Semi-explicit formulae allow us to characterize the behaviour of the solutions and compute global quantities such as the asymptotic speed of the center of...

We present a novel method of computing the asymptotic drift velocity V and the diffusion coefficient D of a particle diffusing in an arbitrary periodic medium. We focus on a particular case of 1D systems with the nearest-neighbor transition rates and explain in detail how our method works in...

Three problems in the statistical mechanics of models for an assembly of molecular motors interacting with cytoskeletal filaments are reviewed. First, a description of the hydrodynamical behaviour of density–density correlations in fluctuating ratchet models for interacting molecular motors is...

In the last decade there has been an increasing interest in generating useful work on the nano-scale to promote transport of particles. The essential theoretical formalism, rooted in non-equilibrium statistical physics, has been successfully applied to the description of physical principles...

The origin of biological motion can be traced back to the function of molecular motor proteins. Cytoplasmic dynein and kinesin transport organelles within our cells moving along a polymeric filament, the microtubule. The motion of the myosin molecules along the actin filaments is responsible for...

We analyse the distribution and the flows between different types of employment (self-employment, temporary, and permanent), unemployment, education, and other types of inactivity, with particular focus on the duration of the school-to-work transition (STWT). The aim is to assess the impact of...