Confined polymers in the extended de Gennes regime

TL;DR

This paper presents an exact solution for the conformations of semiflexible polymers confined in channels within the extended de Gennes regime, linking microscopic properties to conformational fluctuations.

Contribution

It introduces an exactly solvable model for confined polymers in the extended de Gennes regime, providing precise predictions of fluctuation dependencies.

Findings

Exact analytical predictions of conformational fluctuations.

Dependence of fluctuations on channel width and polymer properties.

Validation against experimental and simulation data.

Abstract

We show that the problem of describing the conformations of a semiflexible polymer confined to a channel can be mapped onto an exactly solvable model in the so-called extended de Gennes regime. This regime (where the polymer is neither weakly nor strongly confined) has recently been studied intensively experimentally and by means of computer simulations. The exact solution predicts precisely how the conformational fluctuations depend upon the channel width and upon the microscopic parameters characterising the physical properties of the polymer.