Dimensions of the branches of a uniform brush polymer

Abstract

Excluded volume effects increase the dimensions of the various branches of a uniform brush polymer to different extents. The authors use Monte Carlo methods and perturbation calculations to study the mean-square end-to-end branch lengths of a uniform brush with two branch points, as a function of the number (n) of monomers in a branch and the functionalities (f1 and f2) of the branch points. The mean-square end-to-end length (Rn2) of a branch scales like Bn2v and they investigate how the amplitude (B) varies for the different types of branch as f1 and f2 vary. The amplitude ratios are expected to be lattice independent and they find good agreement between their numerical estimates of these ratios from perturbation and Monte Carlo calculations. They have extended the perturbation calculations to make predictions for the corresponding amplitude ratios for the mean-square radii of gyration of the various branches.