Polyelectrolyte Persistence Length: Attractive Effect of Counterion Correlations and Fluctuations
arXiv:cond-mat/0112337 · doi:10.1209/epl/i2003-00246-4
Abstract
The persistence length of a single, strongly charged, stiff polyelectrolyte chain is investigated theoretically. Path integral formulation is used to obtain the effective electrostatic interaction between the monomers. We find significant deviations from the classical Odijk, Skolnick and Fixman (OSF) result. An induced attraction between monomers is due to thermal fluctuations and correlations between bound counterions. The electrostatic persistence length is found to be smaller than the OSF value and indicates a possible mechanical instability (collapse) for highly charged polyelectrolytes with multivalent counterions. In addition, we calculate the amount of condensed counterions on a slightly bent polyelectrolyte. More counterions are found to be adsorbed as compared to the Manning condensation on a cylinder.
5 pages, 1 ps figure
Cited by in corpus (8)
- Neutral and Charged Polymers at Interfaces
- Variational theory for a single polyelectrolyte chain revisited
- Dependence of DNA persistence length on ionic strength of solutions with monovalent and divalent salts: a joint theory-experiment study
- Adsorption of mono- and multivalent cat- and anions on DNA molecules
- Bending rigidity of stiff polyelectrolyte chains: Single chain and a bundle of multichains
- Effects of counterion fluctuations in a polyelectrolyte brush
- Amphiphile Adsorption on Rigid Polyelectrolytes
- Electrolyte flows under magnetic fields: Manning-like counterion condensation in one dimension