Related papers: Complex Formation between Polyelectrolytes and Opp…
We study the properties of polyelectrolyte chains under different solvent conditions, using a variational technique. The free energy and the conformational properties of a polyelectrolyte chain are studied minimizing the free energy $F_N$,…
Understanding the behavior of charged complex fluids is crucial for a plethora of important industrial, technological, and medical applications. Using coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations, here we investigate the properties of a…
Nucleic acids are negatively charged macromolecules and their structure properties are strongly coupled to metal ions in solutions. In this paper, the salt effects on the flexibility of single stranded (ss) nucleic acid chain ranging from…
Polyelectrolytes are commonly used to chelate multi-valent ions in aqueous solutions, playing a critical role in water softening and the prevention of mineralization. At sufficient ionic strength, ion-mediated…
We present a simple model for the possible mechanism of appearance of attraction between like charged polyions inside a polyelectrolyte solution. The attraction is found to be short ranged, and exists only in presence of multivalent…
Similarly-charged polyelectrolytes are known to attract each other and aggregate into bundles when the charge density of the polymers exceeds a critical value that depends on the valency of the counterions. The dynamics of aggregation of…
We use a coarse-grained molecular dynamics model to study the electrophoretic behaviour of flexible polyelectrolyte chains. We first characterize the static properties of the model with respect to the chain length, the polyelectrolyte…
We study the bending rigidity of highly charged stiff polyelectrolytes, for both a single chain and many chains forming a bundle. A theory is developed to account for the interplay between competitive binding of counterions and charge…
In this work we investigated the question of how the molecular nature of the dielectric media and the polymer-solvent dielectric mismatch affect the collapse of a polyelectrolyte chain in solution by means of dissipative particle dynamics…
We apply extensive Molecular Dynamics simulations and analytical considerations in order to study the conformations and the effective interactions between weakly charged, flexible polyelectrolyte chains in salt-free conditions. We focus on…
We perform extensive molecular dynamics simulations of a charged polymer in a good solvent in the regime where the chain is collapsed. We analyze the dependence of the gyration radius $R_g $ on the reduced Bjerrum length $\ell_B$ and find…
Correlated anion and cation motion can significantly reduce the overall ion conductivity in electrolytes versus the ideal conductivity calculated based on the diffusion constants alone. Using coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations,…
Dilute solutions of strongly charged polymer electrolytes undergo, upon addition of multivaltent salt to the solutions, a phase transition from extended conformations to collapsed or bundled ones. Upon further addition of salt they…
We briefly discuss our recent field-theoretic study of polyelectrolyte complexation, which occurs in solutions of two oppositely charged polyelectrolytes. Charged systems require theoretical methods beyond the mean-field (or self-consistent…
The effective elasticity of highly charged stiff polyelectrolytes is studied in the presence of counterions, with and without added salt. The rigid polymer conformations may become unstable due to an effective attraction induced by…
The collapse of flexible polyelectrolytes in a solution of multivalent counterions is studied by means of a two state model. The states correspond to rod-like and spherically collapsed conformations respectively. We focus on the very dilute…
The nature of electrostatic interactions involving polyanions modulate the properties of both synthetic and biological macromolecules. Although intensely studied for decades the interplay of many length scales has prevented a complete…
We study a solution of long polyanions (PA) with shorter polycations (PC) and focus on the role of Coulomb interaction. A good example is solutions of DNA and PC which are widely studied for gene therapy. In the solution, each PA attracts…
A simple model is presented to calculate the potential of mean force between a polyion and a multivalent counterion inside a polyelectrolite solution. We find that under certain conditions the electrostatic interactions can lead to a strong…
We report on the complexation between charged-neutral block copolymers and oppositely charged surfactants studied by small-angle neutron scattering. Two block copolymers/surfactant systems are investigated, poly(acrylic…