Dynamics of individual flexible polymers in a shear flow

Philip LeDuc, Charbel Haber, Gang Bao and Denis Wirtz ()
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Philip LeDuc: Department of Mechanical Engineering
Charbel Haber: Department of Chemical Engineering
Gang Bao: Department of Mechanical Engineering
Denis Wirtz: Department of Chemical Engineering

Nature, 1999, vol. 399, issue 6736, 564-566

Abstract: Abstract Polymer dynamics are of central importance in materials science, mechanical engineering, biology and medicine1,2. The dynamics of macromolecular solutions and melts in shear flow are typically studied using bulk experimental methods such as light and neutron scattering and birefringence3,4. But the effect of shear on the conformation and dynamics of individual polymers is stillnot well understood5,6,7. Here we describe observations of the real-time dynamics of individual, flexible polymers (fluorescently labelled DNA molecules8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15) under a shear flow. The sheared polymers exhibit many types of extended conformation with an overall orientation ranging from parallel to perpendicular with respect to the flow direction. For shear rates much smaller than the inverse of the relaxation time of the molecule, the relative populations of these two main types of conformation are controlled by the rate of the shear flow. These results question the adequacy of assumptions made in standard models of polymer dynamics5,6.

Date: 1999
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DOI: 10.1038/21148

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