Spaces of RNA secondary structures (Q1312845)

The primary goal of the authors is to contribute to investigations of the secondary structure of RNA. The starting point are bond pictures that give rise to partially ordered sets of macromolecules. For such posets corresponding to classes of ``arbitrary'' and ``binary'' macromolecules (the latter being motivated by the study of secondary structures of RNA) geometric realizations are derived utilizing isomorphisms of posets and certain classes of rooted trees. A geometrical realization is a construction which associates a simplicial decomposition of a topological space to a given poset. The main result of the paper is that the geometrical realization of both the posets of arbitrary and of binary macromolecules are topological spheres. The proof uses techniques from Teichmüller theory and the theory of train tracks.