Monte Carlo study of chain conformations in the swollen middle layer of onion-skin polymeric micelles

Spherical brushes within spherical cavities: A self-consistent field and Monte Carlo study

“…Since the seminal works of de Gennes 11 and Alexander 12 a remarkable progress has been done in the understanding and design of new applications involving flat brushes. [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] In a subsequent stage polymer brushes grafted at curved interfaces either concave [25][26][27][28][29][30][31] or convex [32][33][34][35] have been studied. In concave ͑respectively convex͒ brushes the volume available to the polymer chains decreases ͑respectively in-creases͒, as the chains move away from the interface.…”

“…Nonetheless, despite the large insight obtained from these works, the behavior of spherical brushes in constrained geometries is still poorly understood and has only been addressed in few works: the behavior of spherical brushes and star polymers within slit geometries has been recently addressed by Romiszowski-Sikorski, 69 while the behavior of concave spherical brushes and three layer onion type micelles has been studied by Prochazka and co-workers. 26,27,70 To our best knowledge, the behavior and properties of simple spherical convex brushes confined within spherical bare cavities have not been investigated yet. In addition to the academic interest, the knowledge about how convex brushes behave within a cavity can also provide a helpful insight into the understanding of nanobrush particles encapsulated within composite materials, 6 the preparation of hybrid materials within mini-and micro-emulsions, [71][72][73] as well as in the study of sterically stabilized liposomes and other hairy particles when trapped by macrophages within the body during endocytosis processes.…”