Document EPL, 82 (2008) 46003
DOI: 10.1209/0295-5075/82/46003
The confinement free energies of non-ideal branched polymers and ideal unbranched polymers are the same
R. Ghafouri, J. Rudnick and R. BruinsmaDepartment of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Los Angeles Los Angeles, CA 90095-1547, USA
bruinsma@physics.ucla.edu
received 23 December 2007; accepted in final form 26 March 2008; published May 2008
published online 13 May 2008
Abstract
We use the method of dimensional reduction to show that a branching polymer
with excluded-volume interaction confined between two flat plates has, in
the thermodynamic limit, a confinement free energy and density profile that
is the same as that of an ideal linear polymer with the same number of
monomers and the same monomer-plate interaction potential. Condensation due
to branching is exactly compensated by swelling due to excluded-volume interaction.
61.25.H- - Macromolecular and polymers solutions; polymer melts.
82.39.Pj - Nucleic acids, DNA and RNA bases.
© EPLA 2008