Randomly Charged Polymers: An Exact Enumeration Study
Abstract
We perform an exact enumeration study of polymers formed from a (quenched) random sequence of charged monomers q0. Such polymers, known as polyampholytes, are compact when completely neutral and expanded when highly charged. Our exhaustive search included all spatial conformations and quenched sequences for up to 12--step (13--site) walks. We investigate the behavior of the polymer as a function of its overall excess charge Q, and temperature T. At low temperatures there is a phase transition from compact to extended configurations when the charge exceeds Qc≈ q0 N. There are also indications of a transition for small Q between two compact states on varying temperature. Numerical estimates are provided for the condensation energy, surface tension, and the critical exponent .
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