Simulation study on the adsorption of polymer chains on checkerboard‐patterned surfaces

Abstract

AbstractThe adsorption behavior of polymer chains on a checkerboard‐patterned surface consisting of attractive and neutral square blocks is simulated using dynamic Monte Carlo method. The polymer chain is adsorbed on the surface below the critical adsorption temperature Tc and finally form a recognizable state below the pattern recognition temperature Tr. Both Tc and Tr increase with increasing the block width L. The increase of Tc is because that the effect of neutral blocks reduces with increasing L, while the increase of Tr indicates that it is easy for the adsorbed polymer chain to recognize large pattern. Moreover, below Tc, the polymer chain is in a multi‐block adsorption state (MBAS) and multi‐block recognition state (MBRS) for small L and in a single‐block adsorption state (SBAS) and single‐block recognition state (SBRS) for large L. For moderate L, as the temperature decreases, the polymer changes from the SBAS to the MBAS or from SBRS to MBRS below the single‐block to multi‐block adsorption temperature Tsm. Tc and Tsm increase with increasing N, whereas Tr decreases with increasing N. Lastly, the intra‐polymer attraction helps the polymer chain to recognize in a SBRS.