| Issue |
EPL
Volume 90, Number 4, May 2010
|
|
|---|---|---|
| Article Number | 46003 | |
| Number of page(s) | 5 | |
| Section | Condensed Matter: Structural, Mechanical and Thermal Properties | |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1209/0295-5075/90/46003 | |
| Published online | 15 June 2010 | |
Fresh look at randomly branched polymers
1
Institut für Theoretische Physik III, Heinrich-Heine-Universität - 40225 Düsseldorf, Germany, EU
2
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pennsylvania - Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA
Received:
25
February
2010
Accepted:
14
May
2010
We develop a new, dynamical field theory of isotropic randomly branched polymers, and we use this model in conjunction with the renormalization group (RG) to study several prominent problems in the physics of these polymers. Our model provides an alternative vantage point to understand the swollen phase via dimensional reduction. We reveal a hidden Becchi-Rouet-Stora (BRS) symmetry of the model that describes the collapse (θ-)transition to compact polymer conformations, and calculate the critical exponents to 2-loop order. It turns out that the long-standing 1-loop results for these exponents are not entirely correct. A runaway of the RG flow indicates that the so-called θ'-transition could be a fluctuation-induced first-order transition.
PACS: 64.60.ae – Renormalization-group theory / 05.40.-a – Fluctuation phenomena, random processes, noise, and Brownian motion / 64.60.Ht – Dynamic critical phenomena
© EPLA, 2010
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