Effective interactions between like-charged macromolecules

Abstract

We investigate, within a local density functional theory formalism, the interactions between like-charged polyions immersed in a confined electrolyte. We obtain a simple condition for a repulsive effective pair potential, which can be related to the thermodynamic stability criterion of the uncharged counterpart of microscopic species constituting the electrolyte. Under the same condition, the phenomenon of charge inversion (over-charging), where the polyion bare charge is over-screened by its electric double layer, is shown to be impossible. These results hold beyond standard mean-field theories (such as Poisson-Boltzmann or modified Poisson-Boltzmann approaches).