Eur. Phys. J. E (2015) 38: 69
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2015-15069-4

Regular Article

Shear-enhanced adsorption of a homopolymeric globule mediated by surface catch bonds

Fachbereich Physik, Freie Universität Berlin, Arnimallee 14, 14195, Berlin, Germany

^* e-mail: radtkem@zedat.fu-berlin.de

Received: 7 March 2015
Revised: 19 May 2015
Accepted: 27 May 2015
Published online: 30 June 2015

Abstract

The adsorption of a single collapsed homopolymer onto a planar smooth surface in shear flow is investigated by means of Brownian hydrodynamics simulation. While cohesive intra-polymer forces are modeled by Lennard-Jones potentials, surface-monomer interactions are described by stochastic bonds whose two-state kinetics is characterized by three parameters: bond formation rate, bond dissociation rate and an effective catch bond parameter that describes how the force acting on a surface-monomer bond influences the dissociation rate. We construct adsorption state diagrams as a function of shear rate and all three surface-monomer bond parameters. We find shear-induced adsorption in a small range of parameters for low dissociation and association rates and only when the surface-monomer bond is near the transition between slip and catch bond behavior. By mapping on a simple surface-monomer interaction model with conservative pair potentials we try to estimate the conservative potential parameters necessary to observe shear-induced surface adsorption phenomena.