The numerical study of the adsorption of flexible polyelectrolytes with the annealed charge distribution onto an oppositely charged sphere by the self-consistent field theory

Abstract

The adsorption of flexible polyelectrolytes (PEs) with the annealed charge distribution onto an oppositely charged sphere immersed in a PE solution is studied numerically with the continuum self-consistent field theory. The numerical study reveals interesting scaling relationships between the boundary layer thickness and the surface charge density of the sphere as well as the degree of ionization of the monomers of the PE chains in the bulk solution. The dependences of the degree of charge compensation of the total amount of charges on adsorbed PE chains over the surface charges upon various system parameters are investigated. In particular, the effect of the radius of the charged sphere on the degree of charge compensation is carefully examined. The numerical study indicates that the curvature effect is closely related to the surface electric potential of the charged sphere. Moreover, in this study of the adsorption of PEs with the annealed charge distribution, a comparison with the corresponding case for PEs with the smeared charge distribution in terms of the boundary layer scaling law and the degree of charge compensation is also presented.