Physical Review E 2017-07-17

Marginally compact fractal trees with semiflexibility

Maxim Dolgushev, Adrian L. Hauber, Philipp Pelagejcev, and Joachim P. Wittmer

Index: 10.1103/PhysRevE.96.012501

Full Text: HTML

Abstract

We study marginally compact macromolecular trees that are created by means of two different fractal generators. In doing so, we assume Gaussian statistics for the vectors connecting nodes of the trees. Moreover, we introduce bond-bond correlations that make the trees locally semiflexible. The symmetry of the structures allows an iterative construction of full sets of eigenmodes (notwithstanding the additional interactions that are present due to semiflexibility constraints), enabling us to get physical insights about the trees' behavior and to consider larger structures. Due to the local stiffness, the self-contact density gets drastically reduced.