C E Soteros and S G Whittington 2004 J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. 37 R279 doi:10.1088/0305-4470/37/41/R01
C E Soteros1 and S G Whittington2
Show affiliationsRandom copolymers are polymers with two or more types of monomer where the monomer sequence is determined by some random process. Once determined, the sequence is fixed so random copolymers are an example of a system with quenched randomness. We review the statistical mechanics of random copolymers, focusing on self-avoiding walk models where there are two types of monomers, A and B, which are randomly distributed along the polymer chain. Theoretical, approximate and numerical results are reviewed for models of the random copolymer adsorption, localization and collapse phase transitions. We concentrate on what is known about the existence of phase transitions, the Morita approximation, and results about self-averaging. We also discuss, in less detail, the replica trick and numerical methods including Monte Carlo methods, exact enumeration and transfer-matrix methods. Important open problems are identified throughout and highlighted in the conclusions.
05.40.Fb Random walks and Levy flights
64.60.Cn Order–disorder transformations
82C80 Numerical methods (Monte Carlo, series resummation, etc.)
82B80 Numerical methods (Monte Carlo, series resummation, etc.) (See also 65-XX, 81T80)
82C41 Dynamics of random walks, random surfaces, lattice animals, etc. (See also 60G50)
Soft matter, liquids and polymers
Issue 41 (15 October 2004)
Received 8 June 2004, in final form 27 August 2004
Published 29 September 2004
C E Soteros and S G Whittington 2004 J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. 37 R279
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