Related papers: Polymers with spatial or topological constraints: …
In this paper we investigate the conformation statistics of a Gaussian chain embedded in a medium of finite size, in the presence of quenched random obstacles. The similarities and differences between the case of random obstacles and the…
Confinement is a versatile and well-established tool to study the properties of polymers either to understand biological processes or to develop new nano-biomaterials. We investigate the conformations of a semiflexible polymer ring in weak…
Polymer materials have the characteristic feature that they are multiscale systems by definition. Already the description of a single molecules involves a multitude of different scales, and cooperative processes in polymer assemblies are…
We investigate the tight packing of nematic polymers inside a confining hard sphere. We model the polymer {\sl via} the continuum Frank elastic free energy augmented by a simple density dependent part as well as by taking proper care of the…
The interplay between the topological and geometrical properties of a polymer ring can be clarified by establishing the entanglement trapped in any portion (arc) of the ring. The task requires to close the open arcs into a ring, and the…
In this chapter we review the rich behavior of polymer chains embedded in a quenched random environment. We first consider the problem of a Gaussian chain free to move in a random potential with short-ranged correlations. We derive the…
We introduce a class of models of semiflexible polymers. The latter are characterized by a strong rigidity, the correlation length associated to the gradient-gradient correlations, called the persistence length, being of the same order as…
We analyse the nature of the confinement of an infinitely long (and finite) linear semiflexible homo-polymer chain confined in between two geometrical constraints (A&B) under good solvent condition in two dimensions. The constraints are…
In this paper, we analyze the effect of geometrical constraint on the conformational properties of an infinitely long linear semiflexible polymer chain confined in-between two constraints under good solvent condition in two dimensions. The…
We present an analytical and computational study characterizing the structural and dynamical properties of an active filament confined in cylindrical channels. We first outline the effects of the interplay between confinement and polar…
The viscous flow of polymer chains in dense melts is dominated by topological constraints whenever the single chain contour length, N, becomes larger than the characteristic scale Ne, defining comprehensively the macroscopic rheological…
Studies of random close packing of spheres have advanced our knowledge about the structure of systems such as liquids, glasses, emulsions, granular media, and amorphous solids. When these systems are confined their structural properties…
These notes are devoted to the statistical mechanics of directed polymers interacting with one-dimensional spatial defects. We are interested in particular in the situation where frozen disorder is present. These polymer models undergo a…
Polymers are an effective test-bed for studying topological constraints in condensed matter due to a wide array of synthetically-available chain topologies. When linear and ring polymers are blended together, emergent rheological properties…
Using a formulation of quantum mechanics based on orthogonal polynomials in the energy and physical parameters, we study quantum systems totally confined in space and associated with the discrete Meixner polynomials. We present several…
The structure and function of polymers in confined environments, e.g., biopolymers in the cytoplasm of a cell, are strongly affected by macromolecular crowding. To explore the influence of solvent quality on conformations of crowded…
We study surface effects in amorphous polymer systems by means of computer simulation. In the framework of molecular dynamics, we present two different methods to prepare such surfaces. {\em Free} surfaces are stabilized solely by…
We review recent results from computer simulation studies of polymer glasses, from chain dynamics around the glass transition temperature Tg to the mechanical behaviour below Tg. These results clearly show that modern computer simulations…
In recent times some interesting field theoretical descriptions of the statistical mechanics of entangling polymers have been proposed by various authors. In these approaches, a single test polymer fluctuating in a background of static…
The conformational behavior of a coarse-grained finite polymer chain near an attractive spherical surface was investigated by means of multicanonical Monte Carlo computer simulations. In a detailed analysis of canonical equilibrium data…