Related papers: Stochastic model of randomly end-linked polymer ne…
In this thesis the formation and properties of a polymer gel on and at a surface are investigated. The gel under investigation is defined as a three-dimensional network of "phantom" macromolecules that form permanent links with one another…
Due to their unique structural and mechanical properties, randomly-crosslinked polymer networks play an important role in many different fields, ranging from cellular biology to industrial processes. In order to elucidate how these…
The elasticity of disordered and polydisperse polymer networks is a fundamental problem of soft matter physics that is still open. Here, we self-assemble polymer networks via simulations of a mixture of bivalent and tri- or tetravalent…
Motivated by the organization of crosslinked cytoskeletal biopolymers, we present a semimicroscopic replica field theory for the formation of anisotropic random networks of semiflexible polymers. The networks are formed by introducing…
Biological molecules can form hydrogen bonds between nearby residues, leading to helical secondary structures. The associated reduction of configurational entropy leads to a temperature dependence of this effect: the "helix-coil…
Phase separation within polymer networks plays a central role in shaping the structure and mechanics of both synthetic materials and living cells, including the formation of biomolecular condensates within cytoskeletal networks. Previous…
An assumption in micromechanical analysis of polymers is that the constitutive polymeric media is non-porous. Non-porosity of media, however, is merely a simplifying assumption. In this paper, we neglect this assumption and studied polymer…
Here, we provide an overview of theoretical approaches to semiflexible polymers and their networks. Such semiflexible polymers have large bending rigidities that can compete with the entropic tendency of a chain to crumple up into a random…
The structure of polymer networks, defined by chain lengths and connectivity patterns, fundamentally influences their bulk properties. While existing polymer network models connect chain properties to emergent network behavior, they are…
Reversible crosslinking is a design paradigm for polymeric materials, wherein they are microscopically reinforced with chemical species that form transient crosslinks between the polymer chains. Besides the potential for self-healing,…
We explore the effect of random permanent cross-links on a system of directed polymers confined between two planes with their end-points free to slide on them. We treat the cross-links as quenched disorder and we use a semimicroscopic…
In this study, a versatile methodology for initiating polymerization from monomers in highly cross-linked materials is investigated. As polymerization progresses, force-field parameters undergo continuous modification due to the formation…
We use molecular dynamics simulations to investigate the microscopic and macroscopic response of model polymer networks to uniaxial elongations. By studying networks with strands lengths ranging from $N_s=20$ to 200 we cover the full…
We study the elasticity of cross-linked networks of thermally fluctuating stiff polymers. As compared to their purely mechanical counterparts, it is shown that these thermal networks have a qualitatively different elastic response. By…
A mean field rate theory description of the homo- and co-polymerization of $f$-functional molecules is developed, which contains the formation of short cyclic structures inside the network. The predictions of this model are compared with…
We investigate the network topologies of an ensemble of telechelic polymers. The telechelic polymers serve as links between nodes, which consist of aggregates of their telechelic endgroups. Our analysis shows that the degree distribution is…
We consider a microscopic model of a polymer blend that is prone to phase separation. Permanent crosslinks are introduced between randomly chosen pairs of monomers, drawn from the Deam-Edwards distribution. Thereby, not only density but…
We study the partitioning of cosolute particles in a thin film of a semi-flexible polymer network by a combination of coarse-grained (implicit-solvent) stochastic dynamics simulations and mean-field theory. We focus on a wide range of…
We study analytically the intricate phase behavior of cross-linked $AB$ diblock copolymer melts, which can undergo two main phase transitions due to quenched random constraints: Gelation, i.e., spatially random localization of polymers…
Hybrid double-network hydrogels are a class of material that comprise transiently and permanently crosslinked polymer networks and exhibit an enhanced toughness that is believed to be governed by the yielding of the transient polymer…