Self-association of copolymers with various composition profiles

Abstract

The self-assembly of linear copolymers consisting of two types of segments differing in solubility in selective solvents was studied by Monte Carlo simulations. Chains were represented by self-avoiding random walks on simple cubic lattice and quality of solvent was controlled by pair interaction parameters.

It was shown that even small changes in the sequence of segments within the chains lead to significant differences in the association behavior.

Keywords

• Monte Carlo simulation
• self-assembly
• amphiphilic copolymers
• micelles
• selective solvent