HELICAL COORDINATE SYSTEM AND ELECTROSTATIC FIELDS OF DOUBLE-HELIX CHARGE-DISTRIBUTIONS

We present a helical coordinate system and illustrate its use in solving electrostatic problems due to charge distribution on a double helix. It is shown that for systems with helical symmetry the resulting expression provides the structural information in the solution in a transparent way, with a structure factor separated out displaying the proper symmetry. The expressions for vector operators and other invariants for this coordinate system are also presented. We believe that this method provides an elegant description of physical systems possessing inherent helical structures.