Conformational transition of polyelectrolyte chains extending over the de Gennes regime in slitlike nanochannels

Abstract

The confinement-induced conformational transitions of the polyelectrolyte chain are characterized with the coarse-grained Brownian dynamics simulations and the blob theory. Submicron-sized biopolymer xanthan is chosen as a model polyelectrolyte taking into account both flexible and semiflexible chains for comparison. Confined flexible and semiflexible chains exhibit a nonmonotonic variation in size in weak confinements, where the relative radius of gyration shows a dip and then increases when decreasing the channel width. The rigid chain, realized at low screening, exhibits a sigmoidal transition without minima in size. Major attention should be on the dependence of scaling law exponents on the screening effect of the solution in the moderate confinement of the de Gennes regime. Our findings are expected to provide useful information and new insight into the confined polyelectrolytes when relevant micro/nanochannels are designed and fabricated.