Butterfly Patterns for Stretched Inhomogeneous Gel Networks using Large-Scale Molecular Dynamics Simulations

TL;DR

This study uses large-scale molecular dynamics simulations to explore how inhomogeneity in gel networks causes abnormal butterfly patterns in scattering, addressing discrepancies between theory and experiment.

Contribution

It demonstrates that inhomogeneity in gel networks leads to abnormal butterfly scattering patterns, providing insights into the discrepancy between theoretical predictions and experimental results.

Findings

Abnormal butterfly patterns originate from network inhomogeneity.

The scattering wavevector range differs between normal and abnormal patterns.

Results reconcile theoretical predictions with experimental observations.

Abstract

Large-scale coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations of inhomogeneous gel networks were performed to investigate abnormal butterfly patterns in two-dimensional scattering. The networks were diamond lattice-based with distributions in the number of beads between the crosslink points. Remarkably, the results confirm that the abnormal butterfly pattern orig-inates from stronger inhomogeneity. For the examined systems, the range of scattering wavevector q for the normal butterfly pattern was markedly different from those for the abnormal butterfly patterns. The findings address an essential aspect of the discrepancy between theorical prediction and experimental observations.