熵驱动下柱状高分子刷螺旋结构的研究

自然界中广泛存在螺旋结构,在特定情形下熵能驱动高分子链形成螺旋结构.本文采用分子动力学方法研究柱状高分子刷吸附在无限长圆柱表面时的构象行为.发现其构象与嫁接支链条数、柱状高分子刷与圆柱表面之间的吸附能密切相关.在较弱的吸附能下,具有较多支链条数的柱状高分子刷能形成完整的螺旋结构,其本质就是熵驱动下形成的螺旋结构.该研究有助于加深对生物大分子螺旋结构的理解.

Helical conformation of polymer bottle brushes induced by entropy

Helical formation is fairly ubiquitous in nature. Under certain circumstances, entropy may induce polymer chains to form helical structures. In this article, molecular dynamics is applied to illustrate the conformation behaviors of a polymer bottle brush adsorbed onto the surface of a cylinder with infinite length. The helical conformation of a polymer bottle brush is closely related to the number of branch chains as well as the adsorption energy between the polymer bottle brush and the cylinder. Once the adsorption energy is weak, the polymer bottle brush with enough branch chains may form an entropy-induced complete helical structure. Our results may give a deeper insight into polymer helical structural studies.