Reply to “Comment on ‘Characterization of the tunneling conductance across DNA bases’ ”

Lagerqvist et al.’s Comment regarding the calculation of the transverse conductance of a single-strand DNA heteropolymer translocated through a nanogap between two metal electrodes fully confirms the main conclusions of our study [Phys. Rev. E 74, 011919 (2006)]. In the absence of resonant tunneling, the sensitivity to geometrical factors and the uncertainty in the density functional theory model, which is used in our study and is the basis for the parametrization of the model used by Lagerqvist et al., raises doubt about the utility of static-bias measurements for DNA sequencing. A possible scheme discussed by Lagerqvist et al., the stabilization of geometry by an applied strong transverse voltage $\left(1\mathrm{V}\right)$, is outside the applicability range of the near-equilibrium theory they (and we) used. More advanced theories and precise gap measurements are needed to resolve these issues.