Dresden 2026 – scientific programme
Parts | Days | Selection | Search | Updates | Downloads | Help
CPP: Fachverband Chemische Physik und Polymerphysik
CPP 24: French-German Session: Simulation Methods and Modeling of Soft Matter IV
CPP 24.4: Talk
Tuesday, March 10, 2026, 12:15–12:30, ZEU/0255
Pulling knotted polymer rings and concatenated knotted polymer rings in order to understand the effects of entanglement on the mechanical properties of polymers materials — •Franco Ferrari1, Neda Abbasi Taklimi1, Marcin Piatek1, and Luca Tubiana2 — 1CASA* and Institute of Physics, University of Szczecin, Szczecin, Poland — 2Physics Department, University of Trento, Via Sommarive 14, Trento I-38123, Italy
The topological structure of polymers is expected to produce relevant effects on the mechanical properties of polymer systems. However, to assess the contribution of topology by experiment is difficult, mainly due to technical obstacles in controlling the entanglement during the synthesis process, in particular the formation of knots and concatenations. In this contribution presented are the results of numerical simulations focusing on the mechanical properties of topologically entangled polymer systems. First, the case of single knotted polymers pulled by an external force are discussed. Next, the stress-strain curves of a few concatenated knots with forces applied at different locations are shown. To check the validity of our simulations based on the Wang-Landau algorythm, two different methods are employed and their consistency is verified. The final goal of this research is to understand the mechanical properties of more complex polymer materials characterized by an uniform distribution of knots or concatenated knots of a given topological type.
Keywords: Monte Carlo Methods; Conformation & Topology; Polymer Knots; Ring Polymers; Polyelectrolytes