Topological changes at the jamming and gel transition of a reversible polymeric network

TL;DR

This study explores how the topology of a reversible polymer network changes at the jamming and gel transition, revealing temperature-dependent bimodal degree distributions and spectral properties.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of network topologies in telechelic polymers, highlighting the temperature-dependent bimodal degree distribution and spectral characterization.

Findings

Degree distribution is bimodal with two Poissonian components.

Network topology varies with temperature, affecting node and link distributions.

Eigenvalue spectra help identify the most probable network topology at each temperature.

Abstract

We investigate the network topologies of an ensemble of telechelic polymers. The telechelic polymers serve as links between nodes, which consist of aggregates of their telechelic endgroups. Our analysis shows that the degree distribution is bimodal and consists of two Poissonian distributions with different average degrees. The number of nodes in each of them as well as the distribution of links depends on temperature. By comparing the eigenvalue spectra of the simulated network gels with those of reconstructed networks, the most likely ttopology at each temperature is determined.