Stabilization and Destabilization of Semiflexible Polymers Induced by Spherical Confinement

Abstract

Spherical confinement can act either stabilizing or destabilizing on the collapsed state of a semi-flexible polymer. General free-energy arguments suggest that the order of the unconstrained collapse transition is the distinguishing factor: First order implies stabilization, second order causes destabilization. We confirm this conjecture by Monte Carlo simulations of a coarse-grained model for semiflexible polymers whose chain stiffness tunes the transition order. The resulting physical picture is potentially relevant for other systems under strong confinement such as proteins and DNA.

arXiv comment6 pages, 4 figures

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