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arXiv · 1307.7337

Bundling in brushes of directed and semiflexible polymers

Panayotis Benetatos·Eugene M. Terentjev·Annette Zippelius
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Abstract

We explore the effect of an attractive interaction between parallel-aligned polymers, which are perpendicularly grafted on a substrate. Such an attractive interaction could be due to, e.g., reversible cross-links. The competition between permanent grafting favoring a homogeneous state of the polymer brush and the attraction, which tends to induce in-plane collapse of the aligned polymers, gives rise to an instability of the homogeneous phase to a bundled state. In this latter state the in-plane translational symmetry is spontaneously broken and the density is modulated with a finite wavelength, which is set by the length scale of transverse fluctuations of the grafted polymers. We analyze the instability for two models of aligned polymers: directed polymers with a line tension and weakly bending chains with a bending stiffness.

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Panayotis Benetatos, Eugene M. Terentjev, Annette Zippelius. 2013-10-05. Bundling in brushes of directed and semiflexible polymers. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreve.88.042601

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