Statistical Mechanics of Polymer Systems

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Theoretical research will be conducted on polymer systems. Theories will be developed for calculating corrections to Flory- Huggins theory for the thermodynamic properties of polymer melts, blends and block copolymer systems. Studies will be made of the influence of monomer structure, local correlations, equation of state effects, etc., on interfacial widths and tensions of phase separated polymer blends, on the validity of a mean field description of blends, and on the microphase separation transition in block copolymer systems. The theory will be developed further to treat rigid rods and extended rigid particles in order to describe polymer liquid crystals. Computations will be performed of altered chain dimensions in binary blends and diblock copolymer systems to assess their influence on theories of microphase separation. A theory of long time dynamics of flexible protein molecules will be further developed by evaluating the memory functions in terms of input equilibrium information and including them into the generalized Rouse-Zimm approach. Appropriate simulations will be used to test the assumptions of the theory and to suggest directions for further improvements. %%% This renewal grant will continue studies of theories for polymeric materials. A variety of polymer systems will be studied and appropriate theory will be developed. The principal investigator is one of the leading polymer theorists and this work will help understand these complex, but technologically important, materials.