Phase behavior of polyampholytes from charged hard-sphere chain model.
A molecular thermodynamic theory is developed for polyampholytes from the coarse-grained charged hard-sphere chain model. The phase behavior of polyampholytes with variations in sequence and chain length is satisfactorily predicted by the theory, consistent with simulation results and experimental observations. At a fixed chain length, the phase envelope expands as the sequence of charge distribution becomes less random. With increasing chain length, the phase envelope expands for diblock and random polyampholytes, but shrinks for zwitterionic polyampholytes. The predicted critical temperature, density, and pressure exhibit scaling relations with chain length for all the three (diblock, random, and zwitterionic) polyampholytes.
Jiang
Jianwen
J
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, National University of Singapore, 4 Engineering Drive 4, Singapore 117576, Singapore. chejj@nus.edu.sg
Feng
Jian
J
Liu
Honglai
H
Hu
Ying
Y