A semiflexible polymer chain under geometrical restrictions: Only bulk behaviour and no surface adsorption

Abstract

We analyse the conformational behaviour of a linear semifiexible homo-polymer chain confined by two geometrical constraints under a good solvent condition in two dimensions. The constraints are stair shaped impenetrable surfaces. The impenetrable surfaces are lines in a two dimensional space. The in1nitely long polymer chain is con1ned in between such two (A and B) surfaces. A lattice model of a fully directed self-avoiding walk is used to calculate the exact expression of the partition function, when the chain has attractive interaction with one or both the constraints. It has been found that under the proposed model, the chain shows only a bulk behaviour. In other words, there is no possibility of adsorption of the chain due to restrictions imposed on the walks of the chain. © P.K. Mishra, 2014.