A mean field theory for the swelling of a gaussian polyion

✍ Scribed by Dušan Bratko; Kenneth A. Dawson

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1994
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 531 KB
• Volume: 3
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1022-1344
• DOI: 10.1002/mats.1994.040030107

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

The effect of electrostatic forces among the ionized units on the structure of a polyion is studied using a simplified mean‐field model that represents the polymer as a swollen Gaussian coil. Screened Coulombic interactions are approximated by the pairwise additive Yukawa potential. The swelling parameter is estimated in a variational procedure analogous to Flory's theory for neutral polymers. The analytic solution to the variational problem is given. The method is shown to provide a fair description of the polyion configuration at lower ionization or in the presence of moderate concentrations of simple salt in the solution.