Coagulation-fragmentation for a finite number of particles and application to telomere clustering in the yeast nucleus

► We develop a coagulation-fragmentation model to study a system composed of a small number of stochastic particles. ► The stochastic objects are moving in a confined domain. ► We apply our analysis to study the statistical physics of telomeres (ends of chromosomes) clustering in the yeast nucleus. ► We show that the diffusion-coagulation-fragmentation process can predict the organization of telomeres in yeast.