https://doi.org/10.1140/epjst/e2016-60317-2
Regular Article
Effect of grafting on the binding transition of two flexible polymers
Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Leipzig, Postfach 100 920, 04009 Leipzig, Germany
a e-mail: johannes.zierenberg@itp.uni-leipzig.de
b e-mail: katharina.tholen@itp.uni-leipzig.de
c e-mail: wolfhard.janke@itp.uni-leipzig.de
Received: 1 October 2016
Revised: 28 November 2016
Published online: 5 April 2017
We investigate the binding transition of two flexible polymers grafted to a steric surface with closeby end points. While free polymers show a discontinuous transition, grafting to a steric flat surface leads to a continuous binding transition. This is supported by results from Metropolis and parallel multicanonical simulations. A combination of canonical and microcanonical analyses reveals that the change in transition order can be understood in terms of the reduced translational entropy of the unbound high-temperature phase upon grafting.
© EDP Sciences, Springer-Verlag, 2017
