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PUBLICATIONS

Communication: Counter-ion solvation and anomalous low-angle scattering in salt-free polyelectrolyte solutions

Published

Author(s)

Alexandros Chremos, Jack F. Douglas

Abstract

We investigate the influence of counter-ion solvation on the homogeneity of salt-free polyelectrolyte solutions based on coarse-grained model that includes an explicit solvent. Increasing the short-range attraction interaction strength of the counter-ions with the solvent is found to cause a transformation between a nearly homogeneous polymer solution to a non-uniform solution in which the chains cluster “voids” rich in solvent form. These heterogeneous structures indicate the presence of long-range attractions and their emergence is rationalized by the effect of counter-ion ionization on the interchain interaction.
Citation
The Journal of Chemical Physics
Volume
147
Pub Type
Journals

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5010784

Keywords

polyelectrolytes, association, solution, polymers, long-range
Biomaterials, Composition and structure, Modeling and computational material science, Polymers and Modeling and simulation research

Citation

Chremos, A. and Douglas, J. (2017), Communication: Counter-ion solvation and anomalous low-angle scattering in salt-free polyelectrolyte solutions, The Journal of Chemical Physics, [online], https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5010784 (Accessed April 25, 2024)

Created December 29, 2017, Updated November 10, 2018