Shape Fluctuations of a Droplet Containing a Polymer

TL;DR

This paper investigates how an ideal polymer confined in a droplet influences the droplet's shape fluctuations, calculating the surface free energy and analyzing the effects of polymer and surface energies.

Contribution

It provides a theoretical calculation of the surface free energy due to a confined polymer and discusses the impact of chain self-avoidance on this energy.

Findings

Polymer entropy depends on droplet shape when droplet radius is small.

Polymer and bending surface energies are comparable for lowest modes.

Chain self-avoidance reduces the polymer's contribution to surface energy.

Abstract

We consider the problem of an ideal polymer confined in a droplet. When the droplet radius is smaller than the (unconfined) polymer radius of gyration, the polymer entropy will depend on the droplet shape. We compute the resulting surface free energy. Using parameters appropriate for polymers confined in microemulsions, we find that the polymer and bending surface energies are comparable for the lowest modes. Finally, we argue that chain self-avoidance will decrease the strength of the polymer contribution to the surface energy.